July 2022 – Page 3 – Irregular Bullshit

In Pennsylvania, proposed constitutional amendments moving Pennsylvania firmly in the direction of Gilead at the state level need be passed by both houses of the state legislature again next year before they can go to the voters, bypassing the governor.^[1]

Abortion

Dave Lieber, “Pregnant woman says her fetus should count as a passenger in HOV lanes. She got a ticket,” Dallas Morning News, July 8, 2022, https://www.dallasnews.com/news/watchdog/2022/07/08/pregnant-woman-says-her-fetus-should-count-as-a-passenger-in-hov-lanes-she-got-a-ticket/

Gillian McGoldrick, “Pa. Legislature approves constitutional amendments to declare residents don’t have the right to an abortion, to require voter ID,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 8, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-state/2022/07/08/pennsylvania-senate-advances-constitutional-amendments-residents-rights-relating-abortion-require-voter-id/stories/202207080102

Gillian McGoldrick, “Pa. Senate GOP committee advances late-night amendment to restrict abortion, require voter ID,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 8, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-state/2022/07/08/pennsylvania-senate-republicans-advance-constitutional-amendment-to-restrict-abortion-and-call-for-voter-ids-roe-v-wade/stories/202207080073

Michael D. Shear and Sheryl Gay Stolberg, “Under Pressure, Biden Issues Executive Order on Abortion,” New York Times, July 8, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/08/us/politics/biden-abortion-executive-order.html

Rodrigo Torrejón, “What the Pa. constitutional amendment package could mean for abortion and elections,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 8, 2022, https://www.inquirer.com/politics/pennsylvania/pa-senate-constitutional-amendments-abortion-elections-voting-20220708.html

Matt Viser, “Biden to outline new steps aimed at bolstering abortion rights,” Washington Post, July 8, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/07/08/biden-outline-new-steps-aimed-bolstering-abortion-rights/

Gilead competitive authoritarian regime project

Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux and Nathaniel Rakich, “How The Supreme Court Could Turbocharge Gerrymandering — Just In Time for 2024,” FiveThirtyEight, July 7, 2022, https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-the-supreme-court-could-turbocharge-gerrymandering-just-in-time-for-2024/

Fossil fuels

Northeast (especially Pittsburgh)

Laura Legere, “Judge halts Pa. power plant carbon dioxide rule,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 8, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/business/powersource/2022/07/08/judge-halts-pennsylvania-rggi-power-plant-carbon-rule-commonwealth-court/stories/202207080115

(dis)United Kingdom

Prime minister

Tim Shipman has a detailed look at the hubris, denial, and finally, the realization of Boris Johnson’s resignation that, for the most part, does not get too bogged down in details of personnel.^[2]

Yet in the past nine months, that belief in his own invincibility and the sense that the rules do not apply to him effectively turned a flame-thrower on his own administration. The skills that helped him rise were the reason for his fall. Having been central to the demise of David Cameron and Theresa May, a former No 10 official wryly observed, as the week ended: “Boris Johnson is the third prime minister to be brought down by Boris Johnson.”^[3]

Tim Shipman, “Boris the cat with nine lives has finally been neutered,&rduo; Times, July 9, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/boris-the-cat-with-nine-lives-has-finally-been-neutered-nq7hnwndv

Twitter

There is a new blog post entitled, “Elon Musk’s Achilles’ heel.”

Danny Fortson, “Erratic Elon Musk leaves Twitter with three unbearable choices,” Times, July 9, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/erratic-elon-musk-leaves-twitter-with-three-unbearable-choices-g3tg5zlbt

^[1]Gillian McGoldrick, “Pa. Legislature approves constitutional amendments to declare residents don’t have the right to an abortion, to require voter ID,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 8, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-state/2022/07/08/pennsylvania-senate-advances-constitutional-amendments-residents-rights-relating-abortion-require-voter-id/stories/202207080102 ↩
^[2]Tim Shipman, “Boris the cat with nine lives has finally been neutered,&rduo; Times, July 9, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/boris-the-cat-with-nine-lives-has-finally-been-neutered-nq7hnwndv ↩
^[3]Tim Shipman, “Boris the cat with nine lives has finally been neutered,&rduo; Times, July 9, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/boris-the-cat-with-nine-lives-has-finally-been-neutered-nq7hnwndv ↩

Texas woman thinks fetuses, persons under state law, should count as passengers for car pool lanes

July 9, 2022benfell

Gilead

Abortion

Something like this was probably just about as predictable as, well, Texas:

[Brandy Bottone] says she doesn’t believe the state [Texas] should have it both ways. If a fetus is considered a life before birth, then why doesn’t that count as a second passenger [for car pool lane purposes]?^[1]

The white supremacist gangsters weren’t buying it and an anti-abortion spokesperson explains that the transportation law requires passengers be “outside the body.”^[2] I haven’t looked but I’m really not buying that that language is really in that statute.

(dis)United Kingdom

Prime minister

I did finally reach a finishing point with my search for archived articles on Theresa May. I’ve produced PDFs and removed the private copies of these articles from the Irregular Bullshit. There are probably still some straggling posts on Brexit.

A couple observations: May’s time twisting in the wind, precipitated by Brexit, was probably longer and more torturous than Boris Johnson’s, including the especially delicious failure of Parliament to agree on what they wanted Brexit to look like.^[3] Of course, it was May’s fault, of course, that they couldn’t agree; that’s why she had to go and they had to bring in Johnson, who prorogued Parliament less than two months after he got in.^[4]

Probably the most important observation: Members of Parliament are clowns and Parliament is a clown show. If you’re looking for a defense of representative systems of government, this ain’t it.

The problem of Northern Ireland appeared with the beginning of Johnson’s premiership; it’s still not resolved, by the way. Johnson has always been a lying sack of shit, this was known as he became prime minister,^[5] but he did deliver Brexit, that is, if you don’t count that pesky Northern Ireland problem. So nobody should be surprised or particularly outraged by the whole drama that has led to his forthcoming departure and it is a little, only a little, unfair to be mad at Johnson about it now—this really was the devil’s bargain they all made.

But one commonality appears with both Johnson’s and May’s departures: Giving up power is a very hard thing to do. This is, of course, is the price of taking it in the first place. But it’s striking nonetheless.

^[1]Dave Lieber, “Pregnant woman says her fetus should count as a passenger in HOV lanes. She got a ticket,” Dallas Morning News, July 8, 2022, https://www.dallasnews.com/news/watchdog/2022/07/08/pregnant-woman-says-her-fetus-should-count-as-a-passenger-in-hov-lanes-she-got-a-ticket/↩
^[2]Dave Lieber, “Pregnant woman says her fetus should count as a passenger in HOV lanes. She got a ticket,” Dallas Morning News, July 8, 2022, https://www.dallasnews.com/news/watchdog/2022/07/08/pregnant-woman-says-her-fetus-should-count-as-a-passenger-in-hov-lanes-she-got-a-ticket/↩
^[3]Heather Stewart, Jessica Elgot, and Rowena Mason, “Brexit: May calls for cabinet showdown as MPs reject all options,” Guardian, April 2, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/apr/01/brexit-deadlock-continues-as-mps-fail-to-find-compromise ↩
^[4]Australian Broadcasting Corporation, “Boris Johnson sends British MPs home until October 14 after confirming Parliament prorogue,” September 10, 2019, https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-09-09/boris-johnson-suspends-parliament-until-october-14/11494108; Griff Witte and Karla Adam, “A chaotic final night for Parliament leaves Johnson with bleak choices on the path to Brexit,” Washington Post, September 10, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/a-chaotic-final-night-for-parliament-leaves-johnson-with-bleak-choices-on-the-path-to-brexit/2019/09/10/443a835a-d33a-11e9-8924-1db7dac797fb_story.html ↩
^[5]Robert Hutton and Tim Ross, “His Critics Say He Lies, But Tories Want to Trust Boris Johnson,” Bloomberg, June 15, 2019, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-06-14/his-critics-say-he-lies-but-tories-want-to-trust-boris-johnson; Tom McTague, “Boris Johnson Meets His Destiny,” Atlantic, July 22, 2019, https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2019/07/boris-johnson-profile/594379/↩

Yet another Pittsburgh bridge closes

July 8, 2022benfell

(dis)United Kingdom

I’m still plugging away on filling in the premiership and Brexit pages.

Prime minister

Harry Lambert, “Why Sajid Javid and Rishi Sunak finally lost patience with Boris Johnson,” New Statesman, July 5, 2022, https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/conservatives/2022/07/why-sajid-javid-and-rishi-sunak-finally-lost-patience-with-boris-johnson

Graham Russell and Martin Farrer, “‘Johnson on the brink’: what the papers said about Boris Johnson’s cabinet resignations,” Guardian, July 5, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/media/2022/jul/06/johnson-on-the-brink-what-the-papers-said-about-boris-johnsons-cabinet-resignations

Heather Stewart, Rowena Mason, and Jessica Elgot, “Sajid Javid and Rishi Sunak quit – throwing Boris Johnson’s future into doubt,” Guardian, July 5, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/05/sajid-javid-and-rishi-sunak-quit-throwing-boris-johnsons-future-into-doubt

Telegraph, “This political crisis must be resolved,” July 5, 2022, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2022/07/05/political-crisis-must-resolved/

Kieran Devine, Daniel Dunford, and Ganesh Rao, “Boris Johnson suffers more ministerial resignations in one day than any PM in history,” Sky News, July 6, 2022, https://news.sky.com/story/boris-johnson-suffers-more-resignations-in-one-day-than-any-prime-minister-in-history-12647012

Nick Gutteridge, “Boris Johnson drops heavy hints of snap election – but the Queen could block the plan,” Telegraph, July 6, 2022, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2022/07/06/snap-general-election-what-will-call-boris-johnson-confidence/

Times, “The Times view on Boris Johnson’s position: Game Over,” July 6, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/the-times-view-on-boris-johnsons-position-game-over-t83xkkts6

Max Colchester, “U.K.’s Boris Johnson to Resign After Scandals Grow Too Great to Handle,” Wall Street Journal, July 7, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-k-s-boris-johnson-quits-after-scandals-grow-too-great-to-handle-11657183819

Karla Adam and William Booth, “Boris Johnson expected to resign amid party revolt,” Washington Post, July 7, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/07/07/uk-boris-johnson-resignation/

Stephen Fidler, “Conservatives Aim to Recover the Trust Lost Under Boris Johnson,” Wall Street Journal, July 7, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/conservatives-aim-to-recover-the-trust-lost-under-boris-johnson-11657221679

Ben Riley-Smith, “Mortally wounded Boris Johnson defies Cabinet demands to quit,” Telegraph, July 7, 2022, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2022/07/06/mortally-wounded-boris-johnson-defies-cabinet-demands-quit/

Telegraph, “The only three PMs who had shorter tenures than Boris Johnson,” July 7, 2022, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2022/07/07/boris-johnson-resignation-makes-among-top-four-shortest-serving/

Pittsburgh

Infrastructure

If you can’t afford to maintain your infrastructure, the responsible thing to do is to start closing it, paring it down to something you can maintain. That doesn’t seem to be happening anywhere around Pittsburgh.

Joe Napsha, “Emergency closure ordered for Washington Avenue Bridge in Swissvale,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, July 7, 2022, https://triblive.com/local/washington-avenue-bridge-in-swissvale-bridge-closed/

Mick Stinelli, “Washington Street Bridge in Swissvale closed because of ‘structural concerns,’” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 8, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/local/east/2022/07/08/washington-street-bridge-swissvale-closed-detour-bus-emergency/stories/202207080078

Gilead

Abortion

Gilead competitive authoritarian regime project

Twitter

[T]he terms of the deal [to buy Twitter] mean it wouldn’t be easy for [Elon] Musk to walk away. Musk has agreed to complete it unless something major happens to Twitter’s business, and legal experts doubt the bot issue would qualify.^[1]

Mr. [Elon] Musk’s decision to try to abandon a deal that he initiated—citing an issue [bots] he knew about before agreeing to the transaction—reinforces the billionaire’s reputation for unpredictability. It also leaves major questions about the future of Twitter, which Mr. Musk had pledged to rejuvenate, as the company and other social-media platforms contend with slowing growth in digital advertising and broader economic uncertainty.^[2]

Faiz Siddiqui and Gerrit De Vynck, “Elon Musk’s deal to buy Twitter is in peril,” Washington Post, July 7, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/07/07/elon-musk-twitter-jeopardy/

Meghan Bobrowsky and Cara Lombardo, “Elon Musk Seeks to Abandon $44 Billion Twitter Deal,” Wall Street Journal, July 8, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/musk-says-he-is-terminating-twitter-deal-11657315905

Jeremy C. Owens, “Elon Musk terminates deal to buy Twitter, and Twitter’s chairman promises a legal fight,” MarketWatch, July 8, 2022, https://www.marketwatch.com/story/elon-musk-terminates-deal-to-buy-twitter-11657315801

^[1]Faiz Siddiqui and Gerrit De Vynck, “Elon Musk’s deal to buy Twitter is in peril,” Washington Post, July 7, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/07/07/elon-musk-twitter-jeopardy/↩
^[2]Meghan Bobrowsky and Cara Lombardo, “Elon Musk Seeks to Abandon $44 Billion Twitter Deal,” Wall Street Journal, July 8, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/musk-says-he-is-terminating-twitter-deal-11657315905 ↩

If you believe this, I have a whole bunch of really and truly fully self-driving cars to sell you

July 8, 2022benfell

I have spent the bulk of the morning organizing the results from a search of my archive on “Theresa May.” The idea was to catch more of the story of the United Kingdom premiership as it passed from Theresa May to Boris Johnson, a category that will include the forthcoming handover of power to Johnson’s successor. But the end of May’s premiership was tangled up in Brexit, so I’ve also been organizing that—there’s quite a bit of overlap—and it has all taken much, much, much longer than I anticipated and I have neither completed this project nor caught up on today’s news.

Self-driving cars

If you believe this,^[1] I have a whole bunch of really and truly fully self-driving cars^[2] to sell you:

The move to reduce the staff, [an Argo AI company official who asked not be named] said, is not due to the economic environment or business setback. It’s simply a prudent right-sizing of staff hiring that got too far ahead of where it needed to be, he said.^[3]

Tim Grant, “Strip District-based driverless car company Argo AI cuts staff,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 8, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/business/tech-news/2022/07/07/driverless-car-company-cuts-staff-argo-ai-layoffs-self-driving/stories/202207080047

Twitter

The @barronsonline Daily Newsletter says "it is hard to avoid the feeling that if [@elonmusk] was going to buy the whole company [@Twitter], he would have done it by now." The linked article, however, points to the possibility Musk is simply busy.https://t.co/8NOzXxop2p

— David Benfell, Ph.D. (Public) (@BenfellPhD) July 8, 2022

Gilead

Abortion

This^[4] will matter for about however long it takes for a white Christian nationalist to get into the presidency.^[5]

^[1]Tim Grant, “Strip District-based driverless car company Argo AI cuts staff,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 8, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/business/tech-news/2022/07/07/driverless-car-company-cuts-staff-argo-ai-layoffs-self-driving/stories/202207080047 ↩
^[2]Owen Bellwood, “Self-Driving Cars Still Have A Lot To Learn,” Jalopnik, February 14, 2022, https://jalopnik.com/self-driving-cars-still-have-a-lot-to-learn-1848533182; Christopher Mims, “Self-Driving Cars Could Be Decades Away, No Matter What Elon Musk Said,” Wall Street Journal, June 5, 2021, https://www.wsj.com/articles/self-driving-cars-could-be-decades-away-no-matter-what-elon-musk-said-11622865615 ↩
^[3]Tim Grant, “Strip District-based driverless car company Argo AI cuts staff,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 8, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/business/tech-news/2022/07/07/driverless-car-company-cuts-staff-argo-ai-layoffs-self-driving/stories/202207080047 ↩
^[4]Matt Viser, “Biden to outline new steps aimed at bolstering abortion rights,” Washington Post, July 8, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/07/08/biden-outline-new-steps-aimed-bolstering-abortion-rights/↩
^[5]David Benfell, “My 2024 forecast,” Not Housebroken, June 21, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/03/10/my-2024-forecast/↩

Joe Biden is bored

July 7, 2022benfell

Gilead

Donald Trump

Coup attempt

Katharine Jackson, “Senator Graham says he will not cooperate with Georgia Trump election probe,” Reuters, July 6, 2022, https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/senator-graham-says-he-will-not-cooperate-with-georgia-trump-election-probe-2022-07-06/

Gilead competitive authoritarian regime project

Some of this stuff is so sickening I can barely bear to read about it:

The independent state legislature theory is fewer than 25 years old, and for most of its life, it’s been relegated to the fringes of academia. But it was widely promoted by former President Donald Trump and his allies as they attempted to first undermine — and then overturn — the outcome of the 2020 presidential election. And several Supreme Court justices have already suggested that they’re on board with the theory. During litigation over election laws in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin in 2020, Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch endorsed some version of the idea that state legislatures should have nearly unfettered power over how federal elections are run, and earlier this year, they said in an emergency-docket ruling that they would have ruled in favor of the North Carolina legislature [which sought to overturn its own Supreme Court ruling on a gerrymandered election map].^[1]

Imagine, if you can bear to do so, a white Christian nationalist Pennsylvania state legislature with unfettered power to redraw electoral maps.^[2] The very idea makes me want to retch.

Joe Biden’s bipartisan delusions

When Joe Biden ran for president a lot of people feared he’s fail to see the reality of an increasingly extremist right wing and, indeed, considering he was Barack Obama’s vice president, he was extraordinarily slow to learn the lessons of the Obama presidency.^[3] But it looks like Biden’s problem is even more serious than that.

In the “Today on TAP” newsletter of the American Progress, in which Harold Meyerson highlights Ryan Cooper’s article, Meyerson writes that he would

go a step further. Even the issues that are in his wheelhouse haven’t rated a full presidential treatment, either. Consider, for instance, what happened with his Build Back Better program, clearly the centerpiece of his hopes and plans for his first years as president. Biden didn’t even dominate the discourse on BBB. Joe Manchin did. And despite BBB’s potential for establishing a Biden domestic legacy that could be spoken of in the same breath as the domestic legacies of Lyndon Johnson and Franklin Roosevelt, Biden never made a prime-time Oval Office case for the bill, or even for its very popular particulars.

And that, sadly, is the emerging signature of Biden’s presidency: He simply doesn’t dominate the discussion of virtually any issue, whether it’s outrageous right-wing overreach, horrific acts of violence, or his very own agenda. Like Prufrock, he’s not the protagonist in his own play; for that matter, he doesn’t even swell the progress of his own legislation.^[4]

While I think Meyerson raises an interesting and valid point, Cooper doesn’t actually talk much about “Biden’s wheelhouse.” Cooper rather talks about what Biden finds interesting; in short, if it doesn’t interest Biden, he doesn’t pay attention and he seems to dither,^[5] when in fact, he just doesn’t give enough of a damn to actually make a decision. But on this, as so much else, it isn’t just Biden. It’s the entire mainstream of the Democratic Party: They just really don’t want to confront the Republicans.

Ryan Cooper, “President Biden Is Not Cutting the Mustard,” American Prospect, July 7, 2022, https://prospect.org/politics/president-biden-is-not-cutting-the-mustard/

(dis)United Kingdom

Prime minister

I am a bit perturbed that actual news articles (so-called “live reports,” with their continually changing content, headlines, and authorship, do not, for me, count) indicating that Boris Johnson has agreed to resign—he’s not stepping down immediately—came to me first from U.S. sources.^[6] I’m subscribed to numerous U.K. newsletters and they had indeed confirmed the reports, but I’d yet to see an actual article prior to the Telegraph‘s comparison of Johnson’s duration to other prime ministers.^[7] The Telegraph article, as such, is in fact a bit premature: The exact length of Johnson’s tenure has yet to be determined since he’s not stepping down immediately.^[8]

But now that it’s happening, do not be too terribly surprised if Johnson suffers a premature death from natural causes. I don’t mean this in any way cynically. In my time, I’ve seen a few who, deprived of power, rapidly declined and died, probably earlier than if they’d never been in power. Richly deserved as this humiliation may be, it’s a hard thing for a man to take and I have observed that it can have detrimental effects on physical health.

Telegraph, “This political crisis must be resolved,” July 5, 2022, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2022/07/05/political-crisis-must-resolved/

Times, “The Times view on Boris Johnson’s position: Game Over,” July 6, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/the-times-view-on-boris-johnsons-position-game-over-t83xkkts6

Karla Adam and William Booth, “Boris Johnson expected to resign amid party revolt,” Washington Post, July 7, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/07/07/uk-boris-johnson-resignation/

Twitter

Here’s something entirely meaningless:

Now that [Elon] Musk’s team has concluded it cannot verify Twitter’s figures on spam accounts, one of the people said, it is expected to take potentially drastic action. The person said it was likely a change in direction from Musk’s team would come soon, though they did not say exactly what they thought that change would be.^[9]

The phrase “expected to take potentially drastic action” is a helluva way of not saying much of anything at all:

[T]he terms of the deal mean it wouldn’t be easy for [Elon] Musk to walk away. Musk has agreed to complete it unless something major happens to Twitter’s business, and legal experts doubt the bot issue would qualify.^[10]

So what is “potentially drastic action?” Nobody seems to know. Twitter intends to complete the sale; Elon Musk would need a judge to go along with any desire to get out of it and then would still owe Twitter $1 billion.^[11] We’ll see what happens when it happens. All the rest of this is bullshit.

^[1]Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux and Nathaniel Rakich, “How The Supreme Court Could Turbocharge Gerrymandering — Just In Time for 2024,” FiveThirtyEight, July 7, 2022, https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-the-supreme-court-could-turbocharge-gerrymandering-just-in-time-for-2024/↩
^[2]Jonathan Lai, “Pennsylvania Republicans want a lot more power in redistricting for state maps,” Philadelphia Inquirer, January 10, 2022, https://www.inquirer.com/politics/election/pennsylvania-redistricting-republicans-constitutional-amendment-20220110.html ↩
^[3]Perry Bacon, Jr., “Does Biden Really Think Republicans Will Work With Him? And Could He Be Right?” FiveThirtyEight, January 19, 2021, https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/does-biden-really-think-republicans-will-work-with-him-and-could-he-be-right/; Eric Bradner and Gregory Krieg, “Joe Biden predicts a post-Trump ‘epiphany’ for Republicans,” CNN, May 14, 2019, https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/14/politics/joe-biden-republicans-trump-epiphany/index.html; Moira Donegan, “What does Biden have in common with Trump? Delusional nostalgia,” Guardian, June 21, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jun/21/joe-biden-trump-sexism-delusional-nostalgia; Matt Ford, “Someone Please Tell Joe Biden That Bipartisanship Is Dead,” New Republic, June 12, 2019, https://newrepublic.com/article/154183/someone-please-tell-joe-biden-bipartisanship-dead; William Rivers Pitt, “Mitch McConnell Says Bipartisanship Is ‘Over.’ Believe Him,” Truthout, July 7, 2021, https://truthout.org/articles/mitch-mcconnell-says-bipartisanship-is-over-believe-him/; Matt Viser, “Biden once asserted Republicans would have an ‘epiphany.’ Now he admits he doesn’t understand them,” Washington Post, May 6, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/biden-once-asserted-republicans-would-have-an-epiphany-now-he-admits-he-doesnt-understand-them/2021/05/06/a8204a84-ae77-11eb-acd3-24b44a57093a_story.html; Paul Waldman, “Joe Biden still hasn’t learned the lessons of the Obama presidency,” Washington Post, December 6, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/12/06/joe-biden-still-hasnt-learned-lessons-obama-presidency/↩
^[4]Harold Meyerson to Today on TAP list, “The Silence of the Joe,” American Prospect, July 7, 2022, https://americanprospect.bluelena.io/index.php?action=social&chash=253f7b5d921338af34da817c00f42753.1579&s=1e9c8da033986e0d1f0baa630b5bb784 ↩
^[5]Ryan Cooper, “President Biden Is Not Cutting the Mustard,” American Prospect, July 7, 2022, https://prospect.org/politics/president-biden-is-not-cutting-the-mustard/↩
^[6]Karla Adam and William Booth, “Boris Johnson expected to resign amid party revolt,” Washington Post, July 7, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/07/07/uk-boris-johnson-resignation/; Max Colchester, “U.K.’s Boris Johnson to Resign After Scandals Grow Too Great to Handle,” Wall Street Journal, July 7, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-k-s-boris-johnson-quits-after-scandals-grow-too-great-to-handle-11657183819 ↩
^[7]Telegraph, “The only three PMs who had shorter tenures than Boris Johnson,” July 7, 2022, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2022/07/07/boris-johnson-resignation-makes-among-top-four-shortest-serving/↩
^[8]Karla Adam and William Booth, “Boris Johnson expected to resign amid party revolt,” Washington Post, July 7, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/07/07/uk-boris-johnson-resignation/; Max Colchester, “U.K.’s Boris Johnson to Resign After Scandals Grow Too Great to Handle,” Wall Street Journal, July 7, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-k-s-boris-johnson-quits-after-scandals-grow-too-great-to-handle-11657183819; Telegraph, “The only three PMs who had shorter tenures than Boris Johnson,” July 7, 2022, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2022/07/07/boris-johnson-resignation-makes-among-top-four-shortest-serving/↩
^[9]Faiz Siddiqui and Gerrit De Vynck, “Elon Musk’s deal to buy Twitter is in peril,” Washington Post, July 7, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/07/07/elon-musk-twitter-jeopardy/↩
^[10]Faiz Siddiqui and Gerrit De Vynck, “Elon Musk’s deal to buy Twitter is in peril,” Washington Post, July 7, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/07/07/elon-musk-twitter-jeopardy/↩
^[11]Faiz Siddiqui and Gerrit De Vynck, “Elon Musk’s deal to buy Twitter is in peril,” Washington Post, July 7, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/07/07/elon-musk-twitter-jeopardy/↩

The complicated race for Pennsylvania’s U.S. Senate seat and the not very much simpler one for governor

July 6, 2022benfell

Pittsburgh

Infrastructure

Julia Felton, “Gainey proposes $1.5M contract to assess 150 Pittsburgh bridges,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, July 5, 2022, https://triblive.com/local/mayors-bridge-safety-plan-introduced-to-pittsburgh-council/

Megan Guza, “Swindell Bridge in Pittsburgh closed indefinitely after maintenance work damages drainage trough,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, July 5, 2022, https://triblive.com/local/swindell-bridge-in-pittsburgh-closed-indefinitely-after-maintenance-work-damages-drainage-trough/

Hallie Lauer, “Pittsburgh taps WSP Global to evaluate all 150 city-owned bridges,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 5, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-local/2022/07/05/pittsburgh-bridge-inspections-plan-mayor-ed-gainey-city-council-fern-hollow-swindell-wsp-global-infrastructure/stories/202207050063

John Fetterman

Monica Potts’ notion of the ‘working class’^[1] is essentially what I identified as ‘authoritarian populist’ in my dissertation.^[2] I’d like to be able to refute her, but the truth is, I can’t: She may well be right, at least for the white working class, and though she makes a point of noting that the Democrats are principally worried about losing the white working class, rather than the working class as a whole, and she notes that white people are largely voting Republican since Barack Obama’s presidency,^[3] she seems to mostly be referring only to the white working class when she says ‘working class.’

If we accept that Potts is mostly talking about the white working class, then certainly, my observations of southwestern Pennsylvania seem to bear her out. Though economic concerns were the one issue I was willing to accept as a legitimate grievance of authoritarian populists, it’s important to understand that rather than blaming corporate executives for their economic woes, they blame people of color, a point Potts misses. Which brings us to that other part of authoritarian populism, arguably the larger part, racial and cultural grievances,^[4] and this is what really makes Potts’ description of the (white) ‘working class’^[5] really sound like a description of authoritarian populism.^[6]

Potts argues that Democratic Party appeals to white working class folks will fail because these folks are principally responding to racial and cultural issues, not economic issues, and that the former issues are what motivates support for Donald Trump.^[7] I think she’s probably right here.

Potts is cautious about forecasting John Fetterman’s electoral prospects in his race for a U.S. Senate seat in Pennsylvania, noting that while he did well across the state of Pennsylvania among Democratic voters, it’s less clear that he can peel away moderate Republican voters.^[8]

Right now, all I can tell you is that Fetterman is, by far, winning the yard sign race, at least in southwestern Pennsylvania. His Trump-endorsed Republican opponent, Mehmet Oz,^[9] might, I suppose, still win the seat, but at this point, it sure doesn’t look like he would win with enthusiasm. Oz barely beat his more establishment opponent in the primary;^[10] many Republican voters doubt his fealty to white Christian nationalism.^[11] Thus, it may well be that if Fetterman prevails, this will say less about his appeals to the white working class and more about repugnance toward Oz, and further, thus to fail to refute Potts’ thesis.

Oz might still win.

Because so many doubt Oz’ white Christian nationalism,^[12] his support among those voters is lukewarm. But similarly, it will be lukewarm among moderate Republicans for whom Trump’s endorsement is either not a factor or a mildly negative factor. I don’t have any reason to expect Oz to ever make a strong showing in the yard sign race and though this is sometimes a useful yardstick in gauging support for a candidate, I doubt it will be here.

White Christian nationalists are more likely to turn out for arch-Trumpist Doug Mastriano, the Republican candidate for Pennsylvania governor;^[13] it’s certainly conceivable that Oz might well ride Mastriano’s coattails to victory. But this in turn depends on moderate Republicans turning out for Mastriano, perceived as ‘extreme,’ despite some prominent Republican figures repudiating Mastriano and endorsing his Democratic opponent, Josh Shapiro, or on those moderate Republicans sucessfully persuading enough to split their ticket, supporting Oz for senator and Shapiro for governor.^[14] This is where I have to beg off: I honestly and truly don’t know how this will play because I really don’t have anything even close to that good a sense of the Pennsylvania electorate.

James Carville allegedly described “Pennsylvania [as] Philadelphia and Pittsburgh with Alabama in between.”^[15] And it does seem that statewide races are often a contest between to see if the biggest cities can turn out enough voters to outweigh a stalwart countryside. But with a potential split between moderate Republicans and white Christian nationalists, it’s nowhere near that simple this time, which means I am really without a clue as to how the gubernatorial or senate races will turn out.

But while it’s complicated, particularly with the extreme unpopularity of the Democratic Party right now,^[16] Potts might derive some support for her thesis from a Mastriano/Oz victory. Time only might tell.

Chris Brennan, “‘Mastriano is unacceptable’: A group of Pennsylvania Republicans is organizing to support Shapiro,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 6, 2022, https://www.inquirer.com/politics/election/josh-shapiro-doug-mastriano-governor-republicans-endorsements-20220706.html

Monica Potts, “Why Democratic Appeals To The ‘Working Class’ Are Unlikely to Work,” FiveThirtyEight, July 6, 2022, https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-democratic-appeals-to-the-working-class-are-unlikely-to-work/

Julian Routh, “Group of Pa. Republicans bucking party to endorse Democrat Josh Shapiro for governor,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 6, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-state/2022/07/06/republican-endorsement-pennsylvania-governor-race-democrat-josh-shapiro-doug-mastriano-candidates/stories/202207050085

(dis)United Kingdom

Prime minister

Telegraph, “This political crisis must be resolved,” July 5, 2022, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2022/07/05/political-crisis-must-resolved/

Times, “The Times view on Boris Johnson’s position: Game Over,” July 6, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/the-times-view-on-boris-johnsons-position-game-over-t83xkkts6

^[1]Monica Potts, “Why Democratic Appeals To The ‘Working Class’ Are Unlikely to Work,” FiveThirtyEight, July 6, 2022, https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-democratic-appeals-to-the-working-class-are-unlikely-to-work/↩
^[2]David Benfell, “Conservative Views on Undocumented Migration” (doctoral dissertation, Saybrook, 2016). ProQuest (1765416126).↩
^[3]Monica Potts, “Why Democratic Appeals To The ‘Working Class’ Are Unlikely to Work,” FiveThirtyEight, July 6, 2022, https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-democratic-appeals-to-the-working-class-are-unlikely-to-work/↩
^[4]David Benfell, “Conservative Views on Undocumented Migration” (doctoral dissertation, Saybrook, 2016). ProQuest (1765416126).↩
^[5]Monica Potts, “Why Democratic Appeals To The ‘Working Class’ Are Unlikely to Work,” FiveThirtyEight, July 6, 2022, https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-democratic-appeals-to-the-working-class-are-unlikely-to-work/↩
^[6]David Benfell, “Conservative Views on Undocumented Migration” (doctoral dissertation, Saybrook, 2016). ProQuest (1765416126).↩
^[7]Monica Potts, “Why Democratic Appeals To The ‘Working Class’ Are Unlikely to Work,” FiveThirtyEight, July 6, 2022, https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-democratic-appeals-to-the-working-class-are-unlikely-to-work/↩
^[8]Monica Potts, “Why Democratic Appeals To The ‘Working Class’ Are Unlikely to Work,” FiveThirtyEight, July 6, 2022, https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-democratic-appeals-to-the-working-class-are-unlikely-to-work/↩
^[9]Jonathan Tamari, “Donald Trump endorses Mehmet Oz in Pa. Senate race,” Philadelphia Inquirer, April 9, 2022, https://www.inquirer.com/news/trump-endorses-mehmet-oz-pa-2022-20220409.html ↩
^[10]Hannah Knowles, “David McCormick concedes to Mehmet Oz in Pa. Republican Senate primary,” Washington Post, June 3, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/06/03/david-mccormick-concedes-mehmet-oz-pa-republican-primary-senate-race/; Jonathan Tamari, “David McCormick concedes to Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania Republican Senate primary,” Philadelphia Inquirer, June 3, 2022, https://www.inquirer.com/politics/election/david-mccormick-concede-pa-senate-primary-mehmet-oz-20220603.html ↩
^[11]Gillian McGoldrick, “Trump supporters still unsure about Oz in Pa.’s U.S. Senate GOP race, despite former president’s endorsement,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, May 9, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-state/2022/05/09/donald-trump-dr-oz-senate-run-endorsement-greensburg-rally-dave-mccormick-pa-republican-primary-polling/stories/202205080176 ↩
^[12]Gillian McGoldrick, “Trump supporters still unsure about Oz in Pa.’s U.S. Senate GOP race, despite former president’s endorsement,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, May 9, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-state/2022/05/09/donald-trump-dr-oz-senate-run-endorsement-greensburg-rally-dave-mccormick-pa-republican-primary-polling/stories/202205080176 ↩
^[13]Rachel Bade, Eugene Daniels, and Ryan Lizza, “Takeaways from the biggest primary night of the year,” Politico, May 18, 2022, https://www.politico.com/newsletters/playbook/2022/05/18/takeaways-from-the-biggest-primary-night-of-the-year-00033345; Greg Sargent, “Say it clearly: Republicans just nominated a pro-Trump insurrectionist,” Washington Post, May 18, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/05/18/doug-mastriano-insurrectionist/; David Siders, “‘Beware what you wish for’: 5 takeaways from a key primary night,” Politico, May 18, 2022, https://www.politico.com/news/2022/05/18/pennsylvania-north-carolina-oregon-primary-election-takeaways-00033339 ↩
^[14]Chris Brennan, “‘Mastriano is unacceptable’: A group of Pennsylvania Republicans is organizing to support Shapiro,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 6, 2022, https://www.inquirer.com/politics/election/josh-shapiro-doug-mastriano-governor-republicans-endorsements-20220706.html; Julian Routh, “Group of Pa. Republicans bucking party to endorse Democrat Josh Shapiro for governor,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 6, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-state/2022/07/06/republican-endorsement-pennsylvania-governor-race-democrat-josh-shapiro-doug-mastriano-candidates/stories/202207050085 ↩
^[15]Your Dictionary, “James Carville Quotes,” n.d., https://quotes.yourdictionary.com/author/james-carville/35910 ↩
^[16]Benjamin Hart, “The Democratic Party Is Extremely Unpopular Right Now,” New York, May 16, 2022, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/05/the-democratic-party-is-extremely-unpopular-right-now.html ↩

The things that Boris Johnson can’t bear to do

July 6, 2022benfell

I am not yet caught up.

Gilead

Gun nuttery

There is a new blog post entitled, “Glad all you gun nuts are feeling safer now.”

Michael Tarm, Kathleen Foody, and Roger Schneider, “6 dead, 30 hurt in shooting at Chicago-area July 4 parade,” Associated Press, July 5, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/chicago-july-4-parade-shooting-92b50feb80c19afe7842b9caf08545cb

Pittsburgh

Infrastructure

Boris Johnson

There is another new blog post entitled, “The lesson of Boris Johnson: apologizing, moralizing, and finger-pointing.”

Telegraph, “This political crisis must be resolved,” July 5, 2022, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2022/07/05/political-crisis-must-resolved/

Times, “The Times view on Boris Johnson’s position: Game Over,” July 6, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/the-times-view-on-boris-johnsons-position-game-over-t83xkkts6

Even police white supremacist gangsters are reckless drivers in Pittsburgh

July 4, 2022benfell

Gilead

Donald Trump

Coup attempt

I already had the impression that Liz Cheney was in trouble in her re-election effort.^[1] That hasn’t changed.^[2] And what of her efforts and the efforts of the other folks on the January 6 committee? William Cohan found a couple lawyers who say Donald Trump should be indicted and one who wasn’t so sure.^[3] Merrick Garland seems not to want to indict Trump;^[4] I still think he’ll find a lawyerly way to weasel out of it, which, if your goal is saving what little semblance of an electoral representative system we have, means she’ll have sacrificed her seat for nothing. If, however, the committee’s report is preserved, historians might benefit.

Natalie Andrews, “Liz Cheney Goes All In on Jan. 6 Probe as GOP Primary Looms,” Wall Street Journal, July 3, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/liz-cheney-goes-all-in-on-jan-6-probe-as-gop-primary-looms-11656766802

William D. Cohan, “Will Trump Get Indicted?” Puck News, July 3, 2022, https://puck.news/will-trump-get-indicted/

Pittsburgh

Unauthorized violence

Even the ~~police~~ white supremacist gangsters^[5] are outrageously bad drivers around Pittsburgh. Aggressive off-duty driving got an Oakdale gangster killed Sunday night:^[6]

A camera mounted in [Kevin] McSwiggen’s truck showed him driving north on Freeport Road. A red Ford Taurus was seen in the video passing McSwiggen’s truck on the left. McSwiggen honked his horn and said, “Aw (expletive) it. I’ll just put the high beams on, I don’t care,” according to court papers.^[7]

In Blawnox, where the incident occurred, Freeport Road is, as in most places, a two-lane road, I’m pretty sure with a double yellow line. Ramps to and from Pennsylvania Route 28, where people routinely drive twenty or more miles over the speed limit, are just outside the borough limits, to the south (towards Pittsburgh).

The Taurus, driven by Stipetich, the gangster, apparently cut Kevin McSwiggen off in what was likely an illegal and certainly an unsafe maneuver. Both McSwiggen and the gangster, Charles Stipetich, were armed; both were wounded, presumably by each other, the latter fatally.^[8] With all the gun nuttery around Pittsburgh, I’m frankly surprised this kind of thing doesn’t happen more often.

But what I find interesting in this coverage is a complete absence of attention to the fact that Stipetich’s reckless driving provoked the incident.^[9] This kind of driving is completely normalized around Pittsburgh.

John Hayes, “Off-duty Oakdale police officer killed in Blawnox; man charged,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 4, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/crime-courts/2022/07/04/police-shooting-in-blawnox-leaves-off-duty-officer-dead-another-man-injured/stories/202207040045

Megan Tomasic, “Off-duty police officer killed in Blawnox shooting in road rage incident,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, July 4, 2022, https://triblive.com/local/fox-chapel/allegheny-police-off-duty-police-officer-killed-in-blawnox-shooting/

^[1]David Montgomery, “What Wyoming Really Thinks of Liz Cheney,” Washington Post, October 7, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/magazine/2021/10/07/wyoming-voters-liz-cheney/↩
^[2]Natalie Andrews, “Liz Cheney Goes All In on Jan. 6 Probe as GOP Primary Looms,” Wall Street Journal, July 3, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/liz-cheney-goes-all-in-on-jan-6-probe-as-gop-primary-looms-11656766802 ↩
^[3]William D. Cohan, “Will Trump Get Indicted?” Puck News, July 3, 2022, https://puck.news/will-trump-get-indicted/↩
^[4]Farnoush Amiri and Michael Balsamo, “Jan. 6 panel puts Garland in ‘precarious’ spot, ups pressure,” Associated Press, April 1, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/capitol-siege-merrick-garland-donald-trump-f70143880cb9be8a0610edcad1ed18e8 ↩
^[5]David Benfell, “Stephen Zappala’s resignation would be nowhere near enough,” Not Housebroken, January 4, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2021/06/03/stephen-zappalas-resignation-would-be-nowhere-near-enough/↩
^[6]Megan Tomasic, “Off-duty police officer killed in Blawnox shooting in road rage incident,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, July 4, 2022, https://triblive.com/local/fox-chapel/allegheny-police-off-duty-police-officer-killed-in-blawnox-shooting/↩
^[7]Megan Tomasic, “Off-duty police officer killed in Blawnox shooting in road rage incident,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, July 4, 2022, https://triblive.com/local/fox-chapel/allegheny-police-off-duty-police-officer-killed-in-blawnox-shooting/↩
^[8]John Hayes, “Off-duty Oakdale police officer killed in Blawnox; man charged,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 4, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/crime-courts/2022/07/04/police-shooting-in-blawnox-leaves-off-duty-officer-dead-another-man-injured/stories/202207040045; Megan Tomasic, “Off-duty police officer killed in Blawnox shooting in road rage incident,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, July 4, 2022, https://triblive.com/local/fox-chapel/allegheny-police-off-duty-police-officer-killed-in-blawnox-shooting/↩
^[9]John Hayes, “Off-duty Oakdale police officer killed in Blawnox; man charged,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 4, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/crime-courts/2022/07/04/police-shooting-in-blawnox-leaves-off-duty-officer-dead-another-man-injured/stories/202207040045; Megan Tomasic, “Off-duty police officer killed in Blawnox shooting in road rage incident,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, July 4, 2022, https://triblive.com/local/fox-chapel/allegheny-police-off-duty-police-officer-killed-in-blawnox-shooting/↩

Putting a fork in it: There is nothing left to stop the Orbánization of Amerikkka.

July 3, 2022benfell

Gilead

Donald Trump

Coup attempt

You’ve undoubtedly seen the doubts cast on Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony that she had heard that Donald Trump, in his rage and his determination to go to the Capitol for the January 6 coup attempt, had lunged for the steering wheel of the presidential limousine.^[1] But it turns out that Secret Service agent in question, who now denies the account, is a Trump lackey. Folks are saying he needs to be made to testify under oath.^[2]

Carol D. Leonnig, “Jan. 6 showed two identities of Secret Service: Gutsy heroes vs. Trump yes-men,” Washington Post, July 2, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/07/02/jan6-select-committee-cassidy-hutchinson-testimony-secret-service/

Gilead autocracy project

Andrew Marantz’ article on the relationship between U.S. conservatives and Viktor Orbán,^[3] nearly all of them white Christian nationalists, is a long read and I am very late getting to it. Its retread of Ishaan Tharoor’s work^[4] is minimal and it is much less focused, meandering through descriptions of Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) conventions and a history of the rise of Orbán’s “competitive authoritarian” regime, vaguely warning,^[5] as Tharoor does much more specifically,^[6] that a similar project is underway here.^[7]

For all its faults, Marantz’ article^[8] covers a lot of ground and I do think it is worth reading, more, perhaps, as the work of someone who I don’t think quite believes what he is seeing, juxtaposed with precisely what he is seeing, and who I don’t think quite believes that a white Christian nationalist autocracy can really happen here in the U.S., even as all the evidence points in that direction,^[9] even as it is apparent we have no meaningful institutional opposition to the rise of this regime,^[10] and even as it is apparent that popular opposition to it flails wildly^[11] in an almost certainly vain hope that voters will remain focused on the overturning of Roe v. Wade and the threat of “competitive authoritarianism,” the white Christian nationalist autocracy, and when the “four months [between the issuance of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision overturning Roe and the midterm elections] is a painfully long time to occupy the American psyche,” when “the underlying fundamentals that typically predict election outcomes—an unpopular president, high gas prices, pendular backlash to the party in power—remain unchanged.”^[12]

I warned against my 2024 forecast even as I offered it, I thought at the time, wildly prematurely.^[13] But there is still nothing to stop its fruition: Gilead.^[14]

Andrew Marantz, “Does Hungary Offer a Glimpse of Our Authoritarian Future?” New Yorker, June 27, 2022, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/07/04/does-hungary-offer-a-glimpse-of-our-authoritarian-future

^[1]Amber Phillips, “All the bombshells Cassidy Hutchinson dropped about Trump and Jan. 6,” Washington Post, June 28, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/06/28/cassidy-hutchinson-jan-6-testimony-takeaways/↩
^[2]Carol D. Leonnig, “Jan. 6 showed two identities of Secret Service: Gutsy heroes vs. Trump yes-men,” Washington Post, July 2, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/07/02/jan6-select-committee-cassidy-hutchinson-testimony-secret-service/↩
^[3]Andrew Marantz, “Does Hungary Offer a Glimpse of Our Authoritarian Future?” New Yorker, June 27, 2022, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/07/04/does-hungary-offer-a-glimpse-of-our-authoritarian-future ↩
^[4]Ishaan Tharoor, “The Orbanization of America: The U.S. right walks in Hungary’s path,” Washington Post, May 17, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/05/17/viktor-orban-american-right-illiberal-orbanization/; Ishaan Tharoor, “The Orbanization of America: Florida shadows Hungary’s war on LGBTQ rights,” Washington Post, May 18, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/05/18/cpac-hungary-lgbtq-orban-florida-desantis/; Ishaan Tharoor, “The Orbanization of America: How to capture a democracy,” Washington Post, May 18, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/05/18/orban-democracy-trump-united-states-elections-hungary/↩
^[5]Andrew Marantz, “Does Hungary Offer a Glimpse of Our Authoritarian Future?” New Yorker, June 27, 2022, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/07/04/does-hungary-offer-a-glimpse-of-our-authoritarian-future ↩
^[6]Ishaan Tharoor, “The Orbanization of America: How to capture a democracy,” Washington Post, May 18, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/05/18/orban-democracy-trump-united-states-elections-hungary/↩
^[7]Andrew Marantz, “Does Hungary Offer a Glimpse of Our Authoritarian Future?” New Yorker, June 27, 2022, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/07/04/does-hungary-offer-a-glimpse-of-our-authoritarian-future ↩
^[8]Andrew Marantz, “Does Hungary Offer a Glimpse of Our Authoritarian Future?” New Yorker, June 27, 2022, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/07/04/does-hungary-offer-a-glimpse-of-our-authoritarian-future ↩
^[9]David Benfell, “Start changing the border signs: ‘Welcome to Gilead,’” Not Housebroken, June 24, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/06/18/start-changing-the-border-signs-welcome-to-gilead/↩
^[10]David Benfell, “Democrats and contradiction,” Not Housebroken, July 2, 2022, ↩
^[11]David Benfell, “Swimming against a stronger tide,” Not Housebroken, July 3, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/06/27/swimming-against-a-stronger-tide/↩
^[12]Tara Palmeri, “D.C. Insiders Grapple with the Politics of Roe,” Puck News, June 27, 2022, https://puck.news/d-c-insiders-grapple-with-the-politics-of-roe/↩
^[13]David Benfell, “My 2024 forecast,” Not Housebroken, June 21, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/03/10/my-2024-forecast/↩
^[14]David Benfell, “Start changing the border signs: ‘Welcome to Gilead,’” Not Housebroken, June 24, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/06/18/start-changing-the-border-signs-welcome-to-gilead/↩

Even the Democrats know they’re useless

July 2, 2022benfell

Gilead

Abortion

It’s bullshit, entirely in line with Democratic Party standard operating procedure:

President Biden struck his most aggressive tone on abortion yesterday [June 30, 2022], calling for the Senate to suspend its long-standing filibuster rules in order to enshrine abortion rights into federal law.

Doing so would be an attempt by Democrats to restore the federal abortion rights that were in place for the last half-century with a simple majority vote. Yet Democrats don’t even have enough members within their own caucus to support such an effort.^[1]

Joe Biden is merely responding to other Democratic Party politicians who want desperately to sound more aggressive in their defense of abortion rights.^[2] But as usual, “they don’t have the votes,” because they aren’t actually and never are actually a governing party, so they can engage in all the fiery rhetoric they like, perfectly confident that nothing will actually happen. Side note: Even the Republicans are surprised by the lack of Democratic Party pushback^[3] on the decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.^[4]

Even [the Democrats] admit to being in disarray. “What the fuck are we doing?” a Democratic lobbyist fumed. “What the fuck is the D.N.C. doing? I’m on their listserv and I haven’t gotten a fucking thing, have you? Every woman I’ve seen on social media that’s so mad, I’ve seen no link to, hey, here’s where you vote. If this was the G.O.P. side, that whole apparatus would be mobilized. From the Koch brothers to the N.R.A. to big oil, they would be efficiently mobilizing their base right now.” Asked what they expected to see from fellow Democrats, the lobbyist responded, “I think we’re going to see a lot of hashtags, and some rallies, and a lot of useless shit.” . . .

It turns out that telling people to vote and vote and vote some more in a system designed for minority rule, and where gerrymandering requires the Democrats to produce bigger and bigger turnout for smaller and smaller margins in Washington, can start to ring a bit hollow. How can you vote and win—and yet still lose so badly? Through the din of rage on social media and spontaneous protest in the street, even the most dedicated Democrats could hear the unmistakable, echoing sound of defeat.^[5]

Which is to say, rather loudly, that if you’re hoping the Democrats are the answer to the forthcoming white Christian nationalist autocracy,^[6] even they know and are whispering that they aren’t.^[7] Hell, they won’t even pass voting rights legislation that would keep them in the game;^[8] how, seriously, can you imagine they’d codify Roe?

Ryan Deto, “Supreme Court abortion decision places higher stakes on Pa. election, experts say,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, June 24, 2022, https://triblive.com/news/pennsylvania/supreme-court-abortion-decision-places-higher-stakes-on-pa-election-experts-say/

Matt Ford, “Clarence Thomas Will Wipe Out Marriage Equality and Contraception Next,” New Republic, June 24, 2022, https://newrepublic.com/article/166891/thomas-roe-marriage-equality-contraception

Brent Kendall and Jess Bravin, “Supreme Court Overturns Roe v. Wade, Eliminates Constitutional Right to Abortion,” Wall Street Journal, June 24, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/supreme-court-overturns-roe-v-wade-eliminates-constitutional-right-to-abortion-11656080124

Caroline Kitchener, “Roe’s gone. Now antiabortion lawmakers want more,” Washington Post, June 25, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/06/25/roe-antiabortion-lawmakers-restrictions-state-legislatures/

Jennifer Calfas and Deanna Paul, “Abortion Providers Confront New Landscape After Roe,” Wall Street Journal, June 26, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/in-wake-of-roe-v-wade-ruling-abortion-providers-confront-new-landscape-11656268445

Hannah Knowles and Josh Dawsey, “Pence leans in on abortion, as Trump, other potential 2024 candidates are more cautious,” Washington Post, June 27, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/06/27/abortion-2024-presidential-candidates/

Tara Palmeri, “D.C. Insiders Grapple with the Politics of Roe,” Puck News, June 27, 2022, https://puck.news/d-c-insiders-grapple-with-the-politics-of-roe/

Amanda Seitz, “Instagram and Facebook remove posts offering abortion pills,” Associated Press, June 27, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/abortion-technology-politics-health-media-016eb3efd65dafc2b568af1495f5bac5

Julia Ioffe, “The G.O.P. Inside Conversation on Roe,” Puck News, June 28, 2022, https://puck.news/the-g-o-p-inside-conversation-on-roe/

Tatum Hunter, “You scheduled an abortion. Planned Parenthood’s website could tell Facebook,” Washington Post, June 29, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/06/29/planned-parenthood-privacy/

Caroline Kitchener and Devlin Barrett, “Antiabortion lawmakers want to block patients from crossing state lines,” Washington Post, June 29, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/06/29/abortion-state-lines/

Darryl Coote, “N.Y. AG to Google: Stop directing people seeking abortions to anti-abortion centers,” United Press International, June 30, 2022, https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2022/06/30/New-York-Google-Maps/9871656579373/

Maggie Koerth and Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux, “Even Exceptions To Abortion Bans Pit A Mother’s Life Against Doctors’ Fears,” FiveThirtyEight, June 30, 2022, https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/even-exceptions-to-abortion-bans-pit-a-mothers-life-against-doctors-fears/

Rachel Roubein, “Democrats don’t have the votes to scrap the filibuster for Roe,” Washington Post, July 1, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/07/01/democrats-dont-have-votes-scrap-filibuster-roe/

Pennsylvania

Higher Education

Valerie Myers’ report on the merger of Edinboro University with Clarion and California Universities into Pennsylvania West University (‘PennWest’ for short) is really something of a ‘puff’ piece; it elides entirely the controversy over online learning that roared to life during the COVID-19 pandemic even as students face the prospect of attending classes online when they’re held in-person on other campuses.^[9] My hypothesis would be that students who are more academically mature seem to do better in online classes; these classes seem not to work as well as in-person instruction for a majority of primary and secondary students. Even many undergraduates seem to have trouble with online instruction.

I think online classwork requires the very skills that are necessary to succeed in graduate programs; here the story seems different, with a lot more students at least doing okay. That students at lower levels of educational attainment have trouble with online classes would follow from the lack of time and academic experience to develop these very same skills, namely, self-discipline, critical thinking, critical reading, academic writing, and analysis.

But none of this stuff, be it pedagogical theories or the successes and failure of online instruction, very often gets properly studied. This is one reason I’m suspicious of the Ed.D. degree (doctorate in education): My observation has been that its holders too often peddle policies that have not been rigorously studied and that they too often share the very same aspirations as holders of business degrees, whose academic programs probably shouldn’t even exist.^[10]

Valerie Myers, “What has changed, what won’t, now that Edinboro University has become PennWest,” Erie Times-News, July 1, 2022, https://www.goerie.com/story/news/education/2022/06/24/edinboro-university-pennsylvania-western-july-1-passhe-clarion-california-education-erie-colleges/65352609007/

^[1]Rachel Roubein, “Democrats don’t have the votes to scrap the filibuster for Roe,” Washington Post, July 1, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/07/01/democrats-dont-have-votes-scrap-filibuster-roe/↩
^[2]Rachel Roubein, “Democrats don’t have the votes to scrap the filibuster for Roe,” Washington Post, July 1, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/07/01/democrats-dont-have-votes-scrap-filibuster-roe/↩
^[3]Julia Ioffe, “The G.O.P. Inside Conversation on Roe,” Puck News, June 28, 2022, https://puck.news/the-g-o-p-inside-conversation-on-roe/↩
^[4]Brent Kendall and Jess Bravin, “Supreme Court Overturns Roe v. Wade, Eliminates Constitutional Right to Abortion,” Wall Street Journal, June 24, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/supreme-court-overturns-roe-v-wade-eliminates-constitutional-right-to-abortion-11656080124 ↩
^[5]Julia Ioffe, “The G.O.P. Inside Conversation on Roe,” Puck News, June 28, 2022, https://puck.news/the-g-o-p-inside-conversation-on-roe/↩
^[6]David Benfell, “Start changing the border signs: ‘Welcome to Gilead,’” Not Housebroken, June 24, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/06/18/start-changing-the-border-signs-welcome-to-gilead/↩
^[7]Julia Ioffe, “The G.O.P. Inside Conversation on Roe,” Puck News, June 28, 2022, https://puck.news/the-g-o-p-inside-conversation-on-roe/↩
^[8]Mike DeBonis, “Senate Republicans block voting rights bill, dealing blow to Democrats’ effort to overhaul election laws,” Washington Post, January 19, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/democrats-brace-for-likely-defeat-of-voting-rights-push-due-to-gop-filibuster/2022/01/19/2f9a734c-792d-11ec-bf97-6eac6f77fba2_story.html; Greg Sargent, “Joe Manchin finally makes it plain: He is in favor of minority rule,” Washington Post, January 19, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/01/19/joe-manchin-filibuster-voting-rights-minority-rule/; Veronica Stracqualursi, Daniella Diaz, and Ethan Cohen, “Sinema censured by Arizona Democrats over filibuster stance that blocked voting rights legislation,” CNN, January 22, 2022, https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/22/politics/sinema-censured-arizona-democratic-party/index.html ↩
^[9]Valerie Myers, “What has changed, what won’t, now that Edinboro University has become PennWest,” Erie Times-News, July 1, 2022, https://www.goerie.com/story/news/education/2022/06/24/edinboro-university-pennsylvania-western-july-1-passhe-clarion-california-education-erie-colleges/65352609007/↩
^[10]Steven Conn, “Business Schools Have No Business in the University,” Chronicle of Higher Education, February 20, 2018, https://www.chronicle.com/article/Business-Schools-Have-No/242563; Johann N. Neem, “Abolish the Business Major!” Chronicle of Higher Education, August 13, 2019, https://www.chronicle.com/interactives/2019-08-13-abolish-the-business-major ↩