As all who care are aware, President Joe Biden announced on August 24^th that his Administration was canceling $10,000 in student loan debt for those earning less than $125,000 per year, and another $10,000 in such debt for those who had received Pell grants for low-income students.

In a post in May of 2021, I noted that one could sympathize both with those seeking relief from crippling higher education debt and with the millions of others who have either paid off or are paying off their loans and accordingly might resent any loan forgiveness measure then being urged by some Democrats.  Because the mountain of outstanding student debt was what I termed in that note, “a millstone around the neck of our future economic growth,” I ventured at that time that forgiving much if not all of such debt seemed a means to spur long-term economic growth that would benefit both those whose loans were forgiven and those who paid off their loans.  Although the high levels of inflation we are now experiencing didn’t occur to me – an oversight, given our last 40 years’ experience, that might be excused – I failed to take into account that such a debt-forgiveness measure would do nothing to curb rising college education costs or, more importantly, at least theoretically (since neither party’s officeholders seem to care any longer about our burgeoning national debt) add notably to the federal debt borne by all taxpayers, including those who perhaps for financial reasons didn’t go to college or managed to avoid incurring college loan debt.

What follows is the verbatim text of an email I received from a close friend – one sympathetic to the Biden Administration – the day after the decision was announced.  He termed it a “Rant.”  I received his permission to publish his email here.  Having considered the issue from more angles than I did last year, I associate myself with his remarks  😉 . 

“I think the student loan forgiveness policy is an awful decision.  $600-800B deficit spending with no revenue offsets.  Questionable legal authority tied to “emergency” powers in the Heroes Act (of all things!) that stretches the limits of presidential authority to a new breaking point.  It can only be viewed as inflationary at a time when we had just been making some progress on turning the corner on an inflation crisis and the power of the issue was starting to wane for the midterm elections.  It plays right into MAGA hands as it can be painted as elitist, making a direct “payment” to the college-educated at a time when the Democratic party is struggling to retain its historical blue-collar base.  Those who pursued trades occupations should be rightly insulted.  (See  https://www.newsweek.com/mike-rowe-slams-student-debt-forgiveness-1555317.)   It’s anathema to American Families taking accountability for their decisions and “educating” their children about the costs and payoffs of attending various colleges or other post-secondary learning or experiences.  Provides more red meat for the Republicans to take away Democratic momentum driven by the Roe decision.   A clear instance of caving to or at least mollifying far left progressives (who will not be pleased as it didn’t go far enough).  

The mid-term election fortunes were shifting. The Roe issue was “winning” over inflation.  Few if any candidates were asking for direct participation from Biden/the White House.  I can only conclude that this is an issue where Biden let his legacy and ego get the better of him.” 

Although some pundits are opining that the Administration action will help Democrats in this fall’s elections, I share our friend’s concern that Mr. Biden may have committed an unforced political blunder that will hurt his party’s prospects.  I know that we both hope that our fears prove unfounded.

[If one intends to review this post, but has not yet read Part I (which is below), I would start there.]

As many have observed in recent days, if U.S. WY Rep. Liz Cheney elects to launch a campaign for the 2024 Republican Party presidential nomination, she will bring formidable assets to what I would see as a political guerilla effort – her goal being to politically weaken former President Donald Trump for the November 2024 general presidential election, not to defeat him for the Republican nomination.  She has strong name recognition and positive renown among many of our citizens (if not the Trumplicans), a strong campaign financial position coupled with enviable fund raising opportunities which will enable her to persevere despite what will almost certainly be disappointing objective results on the primary circuit, her pick of the best Republican strategists repulsed by the Trumplican movement, and a lot of sympathetic media.  While these are vital to her effort, all are but tactical tools to fulfill her strategy.  Unlike virtually every other presidential campaign I’ve ever heard of — in which the candidate dreams, no matter how quixotically, of achieving the White House, and thus seeks to pick up delegates in all states — Ms. Cheney’s aim from the outset will be to sow enough doubt about Mr. Trump in the states that will decide the 2024 November presidential election (judging by 2020, Georgia, Arizona, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Michigan, Nevada, Florida, Minnesota, and New Hampshire) to deny Mr. Trump the presidency.  As such, I would submit that the important figure in her recent Wyoming Republican primary loss was not her opponent’s total, or the margin by which she lost, but rather the 28% that voted for her.  (I think it’s tenable to pose that the cross-over Democratic votes she received substituted to some extent for the votes of Republican Cheney supporters who didn’t participate because they knew she was going to be soundly defeated.)  A recent NBC News poll found that 57% of Americans want the investigations into Mr. Trump to continue, a seemingly reasonable indicator that he has significant political weakness with the general electorate (although it would obviously be more meaningful to have snapshots of the voters’ attitudes toward the investigations in the respective pivotal Electoral College states).  In order to condition her supporters to what will be disappointing primary vote totals by traditional political standards, from the outset of her campaign she must consistently message that she does not expect to out-poll Mr. Trump in any primary.  If through her campaign she can persuade perhaps 15% of self-described Republicans (about half of the sample size of her primary support) and a good share of the conservative Independents in swing states that they cannot support Mr. Trump in the 2024 November election, I don’t think he can reclaim the presidency if the Democrats run a suitable candidate (this latter caveat the subject of a previous post).

Some suggest that it will be difficult for Ms. Cheney to mount a nationwide campaign because those state Republican organizations under Mr. Trump’s control will seek to keep her off their primary ballots.  This would only matter if she was in it to win it.  I’ll hazard that her guerilla effort gains more than it loses where she’s kept off the ballot and can straightforwardly claim that a state’s Republican apparatus has been “rigged” against her.

Some suggest that the National Republican Committee will go to any lengths to keep Ms. Cheney out of any debates with Mr. Trump.  While such a shutout is the only logical course for Mr. Trump to take — I think most observers would expect Ms. Cheney to score heavily — if he doesn’t debate, such a maneuver will nonetheless put him in a box he won’t like:  he won’t be able to escape the impression that he’s afraid to debate … a woman.  Recently, Arizona Republican Gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake actually lauded Mr. Trump’s “BDE.” (For those of you scoring at home, that’s “Big Dick Energy.”  Yes, really.)  What Ms. Cheney could do with an “Empty Chair” debate format in lieu of an exchange with Mr. Trump is tantalizing.  She could repeatedly point out that Mr. Trump was scared to face … a girl.  Right in front of our eyes, his BDE would … shrivel.  (I know, I know; I just couldn’t help myself.)  

Two final notes.  First, it is ironic that if Rep. Cheney actually won the Republican nomination – seemingly more than theoretically possible if she was facing not Mr. Trump himself but a field of Trump Wannabes, who would split the pro-Trump vote in the early primaries, perhaps enabling her to seize the nomination in a reverse of the strategy Mr. Trump himself used in 2016 – I think she’d have a much easier path to the presidency than Mr. Trump has.  Traditional Republicans are tribal – they’ve shown themselves in the Trump Era to be willing to vote for anyone bearing the Republican mantle — and in the 2024 November election Ms. Cheney could probably compensate for the loss of Trumplican cultists with the votes of Independents and moderate Democrats grateful that she deposed Mr. Trump.

Second, as Mr. Trump continues to incite violence in a transparent attempt to avoid what now appears impending prosecution for a myriad of crimes, I wonder whether he realizes that if Ms. Cheney runs against him, and any of his supporters attempt to visit violence upon her, he will not be able to escape responsibility for the shock that would register in the minds of a determinative majority of Americans.  Even if he is able to stay out of jail, I think he would be finished politically, no matter whom the Democrats nominate for president.  Since he has no moral compass, hopefully he’ll realize that for his own good, he should immediately strongly speak out against violence toward Ms. Cheney if she mounts a presidential campaign against him.  I hope he will.  Since he’s emotionally a bad-seed preschooler, I realize he won’t.

When President Biden, a genuinely good man, assumed the presidency in January, 2021, I hoped that by his manner he could reintroduce some sanity and comity across most of our political spectrum.  Mr. Trump’s persistence in his Big Lie, the zealous gullibility of his supporters, and the traitorous discord sown over the last two years by Mr. Trump, his minions, and alt-right propagandists such as Fox News, have dashed such hopes.  Hoping for a gradual resolution of the toxicity inflamed by Mr. Trump hasn’t worked.  Now, the battle needs to be directly joined.  I see no one but Liz Cheney that can inject an antitoxin that will cleave the Republican Party and protect our republic.  She will obviously bide her time until 2023, to avoid providing Mr. Trump’s cohort the opportunity to cast an overt political taint on the work of the U.S. House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, for which she serves as Vice Chair.  I hope she will run, but she’s not my wife or daughter.  Given the physical dangers she will face if she mounts a campaign, I would fully understand if her husband, children, and parents hope that she doesn’t.

[Note:  the notions set forth in this post are ultimately based upon the perhaps questionable assumption that Trumplicans who have captured discretionary control of the electoral mechanisms in some swing states don’t deny the 2024 Democratic presidential nominee fairly-won Electoral College votes.]

What follows is largely cast on the presumption that former President Donald Trump will seek the 2024 Republican nomination for president.  At this juncture it seems overwhelmingly likely he will, and – perhaps to the surprise of those who know that I consider him and his acolytes a fascist cult – I hope he does. Trump Wannabes such as FL. Gov. Ron DeSantis are clearly seeking to exploit the resentment and unrest Mr. Trump has incited to their own political advantage, but such Wannabes, although potentially every bit as anti-democratic as Mr. Trump, would carry less baggage into a 2024 presidential election and thus, be harder for a Democrat to defeat; furthermore, even if a Wannabe was defeated, such might only serve to reinforce rather than diminish Mr. Trump’s corrosive influence.  I would submit that what we have seen over the last two years makes it clear that Mr. Trump himself must be defeated – he needs to be made a two-time loser — if we are going to start to excise the growing cancer in the American polity to which he has given license.

As all who care are aware, last week U.S. WY Rep. Liz Cheney lost the Republican primary to run as the party’s nominee for the Wyoming Congressional seat she now holds — to a Trump supplicant, by a 66.3% to 28.9% margin — and thus, will be leaving Congress at the end of this year.

Media commentators are now jumping over each other to declare that Ms. Cheney might run for the 2024 Republican nomination for president.  She has reportedly strongly hinted at a presidential campaign in interviews.  In January and May I speculated in these pages that she might mount such a presidential run, and upon the effect that such a campaign could have on the White House aspirations of Mr. Trump or, if Mr. Trump decided not to run, upon those of Trump Wannabes such as Mr. DeSantis.

First:  If Ms. Cheney declares for the presidency, she will, given the increasing tendency to violence fomented by Mr. Trump among his cult, be exposing herself to the most imminent physical danger of any presidential candidate at least as far back as U.S. MA Sen. Edward Kennedy’s 1980 campaign (Mr. Kennedy’s family and advisors then understandably feared the possibility that an unbalanced assailant might seek to replicate the assassinations of Mr. Kennedy’s brothers).  Such a campaign will require extraordinary physical courage.  If advising Ms. Cheney, I would therefore point out that she has strong reasons not to make a run:  foremost, her husband and five children.  I would also indicate what I am pretty sure she already knows:  she is probably the only person in America that has a real chance to bring about the political demise of Donald Trump.

Some pundits have suggested that Ms. Cheney might seek to confront Mr. Trump through a communications strategy rather than a political campaign.  If she is indeed willing to continue her battle with Mr. Trump, she should reject such a notion.  Think of the clever but largely ineffective work of The Lincoln Project.  It’s hard to see how any similar effort by Ms. Cheney – who, under such an approach, would be “yesterday’s news” – would be any more successful.

To command and maintain the media attention that an effective effort against Mr. Trump will require, Ms. Cheney needs to be “news,” which means that she must – to borrow a phrase from former President Richard Nixon – enter the Arena.  She must declare her candidacy for the Republican nomination for president.  I believe she knows this.  (If her goal is to keep Mr. Trump out of the White House, she cannot run as an Independent.  I am pretty sure that she and those around her must realize that such an Independent effort would ultimately siphon from the Democratic nominee the votes of those moderately-conservative voters uneasy with progressive policies who are nonetheless determined to vote against Mr. Trump; any split in the anti-Trump vote in November, 2024, will obviously enhance Mr. Trump’s chances to reclaim the presidency.)

Because Rep. Cheney has virtually no chance of securing the Republican nomination – of which I am also pretty confident that she is aware — I’ve heard more than one commentator accordingly declare that any campaign she would launch would be a “kamikaze mission.”  I disagree.  I would submit that her campaign from its very outset would be more accurately described as political guerrilla warfare – intended to weaken the enemy, not to defeat him outright.  The form such an effort might take will be addressed in Part II of this note.

[First, a qualification:  although I have heard legal analysts comment that the FBI’s recent search of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-A-Lago estate was not a “raid” because it was seemingly undertaken entirely according to lawful procedures, the word, “raid,” is nonetheless used at points in this note because it is significantly easer and shorter than the phrase, “a search conducted by the FBI pursuant to a warrant issued by a federal judge upon a finding of probable cause that evidence would be discovered leading to conviction of a crime.”  😉 ].

I suggested in an earlier post that in U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland’s place, what might cause me to refrain from bringing criminal charges against Mr. Trump – despite my beliefs that no one is above the law, and that there is cogent evidence that Mr. Trump is guilty of seditious conspiracy – was the practical problem of empaneling 12 open-minded jurors in an environment in which at least a third of Americans are in Mr. Trump’s cult.  I would feel – and strongly suspect that Mr. Garland feels – that for the good of the country, one cannot afford to bring criminal charges against Mr. Trump, and lose.

That said, my reluctance was expressed when considering and in the context of crimes that inevitably have a subjective element – and thus, the potential for Mr. Trump’s plausible deniability – including not only seditious conspiracy but crimes such as the instances of obstruction of justice described by Special Counsel Robert Mueller in Volume II of his report.

In apparently determining to first pursue Mr. Trump under the Presidential Records Act (the “PRA”), Attorney General Merrick Garland and the Department of Justice (the “DOJ”) team are seemingly being pretty tactical, but pragmatic.  They have perhaps chosen to start with an arguably relatively innocuous statute – at least as compared to the legion of other, potentially more momentous, charges for which there appears to be compelling evidence against Mr. Trump – because proving a PRA offense could be the most objective, and thus, the easiest to establish.  (That said, how harmless the offense might be will obviously ultimately depend on what, if any, material Mr. Trump might be proven to have illegally kept; more on this below.)  It’s up or down, black or white.  Mr. Trump either had illegally retained documents under his control at the time of the raid, or he didn’t.  Clearly, Mr. Garland – and the federal judge authorizing the Mar-A-Lago search warrant, based upon the DOJ affidavit presented in support of the warrant application – had a strong belief that he did.  If such records were on the Mar-A-Lago estate, presumably the FBI now has them.  Since negotiations regarding these records have reportedly gone on for months between Mr. Trump and federal authorities, it will seemingly be difficult for the former president to claim that he didn’t know that he had them (if he indeed did).  The DOJ perhaps considers the PRA the simplest vehicle to establish a straightforward violation with the potential for securing a relatively quick conviction.

Even so – and despite all the chortling by liberal media outlets – the obtaining of a search warrant and the execution of the attendant search doesn’t constitute an indictment, much less a conviction, of Mr. Trump.  Even if he is ultimately indicted and convicted, a fairly quick internet search of legal authority sets forth a legal view that such conviction would not, despite the PRA’s purported prohibition upon a perpetrator’s holding of federal office, prevent Mr. Trump from seeking and assuming the presidency because Congress doesn’t have the power to add hurdles to a citizen’s right to become president that are not set forth in the Constitution.

The ramifications of this week’s raid may ultimately be determined by what was retrieved.  If something truly significant was recovered, and can be publicized, such will seemingly have an impact upon Mr. Trump’s political fortunes as well as his personal freedom.  (I note with interest reports that Mr. Trump’s legal and media defenders – who for the most part probably have no better idea than anyone else what might have been recovered – are suggesting that the FBI might have “planted” evidence on Mr. Trump, laying the groundwork to enable them to sow doubt about any serious transgression in the minds of Mr. Trump’s credulous followers.)  On the other hand, if what Mr. Trump had in his possession merely amounts to a technical but inconsequential violation – what basketball fans call a “ticky-tack foul” – such could have little effect on Mr. Trump’s political aspirations or perhaps even generate sympathy for him among the moderately-conservative voter segments whose support he needs to reclaim the presidency. 

As Mr. Trump was fond of saying during his presidency:  We’ll see what happens.  Maybe this week’s raid will amount to something; perhaps it will amount to nothing.  However, and as many are aware, Al Capone was never convicted of murder, extortion, or bootlegging; he was ultimately brought low by a conviction for income tax evasion.  Perhaps Mr. Trump will suffer a similar fate due to an infraction far afield from the many, seemingly more significant, betrayals of our republic for which there is persuasive evidence of his guilt.

[Note:  this post is based on the perhaps questionable assumption that Trumplicans who have assumed discretionary control of the electoral mechanisms in some swing states don’t deny the 2024 Democratic presidential nominee fairly-won Electoral College votes.]

I would submit that each party has a two-word obstacle that it must finesse in order to win the White House in 2024.

The Republicans’ two-word problem is pretty obvious:  Donald Trump.  Given all of the opportunity we’ve had since 2015 to contemplate the former president’s psyche, I think it takes little insight to suggest that he is viscerally unable to relinquish the stage; he desperately fears being left behind, forgotten.  I may at some point have to concede that I was wrong, but I currently can’t believe that Mr. Trump won’t seek the Republican 2024 Presidential nomination.  If he wins the nomination, all of the animosities he stirs in those who oppose him, taken together with the political wounds he has seemingly suffered as a result of the hearings of the U.S. House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (the “Committee”), plus all of the unease and weariness that would exist in conservative Independent and moderate Republican quarters at the prospect of having to again deal with him, make it seem to me that it will be difficult for him to defeat the right Democratic presidential candidate (more on that below) in enough swing states to reclaim the presidency.  On the other hand, if he loses the nomination, I would venture that Republicans are fantasizing if they think that Mr. Trump – who in defeat will almost certainly retain the diehard allegiance of at least one-third of the Republican base — will docilely accept his defeat and line up behind the nominee.  The former president will instead claim that every primary he lost was “rigged” or “stolen.”  He will loudly and continuously denounce the GOP nominee.  He will threaten to start his own party – and may follow through.  In short, he will stir up enough discontent and uncertainty that in swing areas, enough disgruntled Trumplicans may stay home to enable the right Democrat to win in the Electoral College – which is the only tally that matters.

[I deliberately pass over the debate as to whether Mr. Trump should be prosecuted for sedition.  While I personally consider Mr. Trump guilty of sedition based upon the evidence uncovered by the Committee (while recognizing, of course, that if obliged to sit on a jury judging Mr. Trump, I would have to steel my mind and soul to consider only the sufficiency of the evidence admitted in his criminal trial), I am against such prosecution not because of any worry that such will set a precedent for future political persecutions but because I consider it extremely doubtful that with at least a third of our citizens in Mr. Trump’s cult, any prosecutorial team will be able to persuade twelve jurors to find Mr. Trump guilty of sedition beyond a reasonable doubt.  The Biden Justice Department can’t, for the good of the country, afford to bring a case against Mr. Trump, and lose.]

The Democrats’ two-word problem is almost as obvious:  Kamala Harris.  While I consider President Joe Biden to have thus far done a good job overall – a discussion for a separate post – he is showing every bit of his approximately 80 years (even those that support him concede that he looks old).  Elections are about matchups; up against Mr. Trump, he might well win despite his advanced years — by simply running on a slogan, “Do you really want to go back to him?” – but against any other, inevitably more vital-appearing, Republican nominee, it’s difficult to conceive of him overcoming understandable reservations among Independents about his ability to serve out his term.  Accordingly, if he runs and retains Vice President Harris as his running mate, this will necessarily cause any open-minded voter to seriously consider whether she is qualified to be president.  My conclusion – not new to anyone who read a number of entries in these pages during the 2020 Democratic Presidential Nomination process, and regrettably unchanged by anything I’ve seen in Ms. Harris’ performance as Vice President – is, she’s not.  My impression of Ms. Harris seems, crucially, to be shared by a number of our progressive Madison, WI friends.  If they have misgivings about her ability to conduct the presidency, concerns about her among Independents and moderate Republicans – the electoral segments which will determine the outcome of the 2024 presidential election – make her a political liability that could sink Mr. Biden even against Mr. Trump, and an albatross that he cannot afford against any other Republican presidential nominee.

If the President is serious about running again, I hope that his closest aide will be sitting down with Ms. Harris immediately after the midterms, advising her that she will soon be announcing that for personal reasons and with great regret, she had advised Mr. Biden to nominate someone else to run with him in 2024. 

I would suggest that the 2024 political hazard Ms. Harris presents to Democrats is potentially exponentially magnified if Mr. Biden chooses not to seek a second term.  Unless the Vice President affirmatively and promptly declares that she will not seek the presidency, Mr. Biden’s withdrawal will immediately cause some in the media – in both liberal and conservative quarters, for different reasons — to anoint Ms. Harris as the frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination.  If she seeks the 2024 Democratic Presidential nomination, I have severe doubts that progressive Democrats – who have an outsized voice in party affairs — will be able to unemotionally and pragmatically assess her qualifications and electoral prospects.  If she wins the nomination, I — as a resident of Wisconsin, which has become the ultimate swing state — don’t think she will be able to carry this state against Mr. Trump, let alone any other likely Republican presidential nominee with less baggage.  I’m finding that even those of our progressive Madison, WI, friends who are unwilling to express outright doubts about her competence have little faith in her Wisconsin electoral prospects.  If she can’t win here, it’s difficult to see how she can win the presidency.  If she seeks the nomination but loses the nomination to another candidate, I fear that it will be after a bitter campaign in which Democrats supporting any other candidate who is not also a woman of color will be denounced by the Woke segments of the party as either misogynist (if the competing candidate is male) or racist (if the competing candidate is white) or both (if the competing candidate is a white male) – despite the fact that there are regular indications that rank-and-file Democrats who are women and/or of color pragmatically prioritize competence and electability over diversity.  In a dilemma corresponding to the internecine discord facing Republicans related to Mr. Trump’s candidacy, I have severe doubts that if Ms. Harris runs, Democrats will be able to escape their own diversity-focused Wokeness sufficiently to cohere to defeat determined and organized Republican organizations in swing states (subject to the caveat that they might be able to do so if the opponent is Mr. Trump).

Make no mistake:  running against the wrong Democrat, Mr. Trump – or another like-minded Republican intent on instituting an American Apartheid – could fairly (i.e., without manipulation or fraud) win an Electoral College majority (if not the popular vote) in 2024, and thus, the presidency; if such a Republican does win the White House, the Republicans will not give it back.  And so:  who at this extremely early stage do I consider to be the right candidate for the Democrats’ 2024 Presidential nomination?  U.S. MN Sen. Amy Klobuchar is the first that comes to mind.  From a politically pragmatic standpoint, I am hoping that Mr. Biden and Ms. Harris will step back to clear the way for Ms. Klobuchar or some other competent and electable moderate Democrat to give us an opportunity to preserve our democracy in 2025 and beyond.

One benefit of retirement is that it will enable me to watch most if not all of the upcoming hearings of United States House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack, the first of which will proceed this evening.  Anyone who has followed these pages for any length of time – and seen the analogies drawn between the activities of former President Donald Trump and his cohort and passages in Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf – knows the deep antipathy for and concern I have about what the former president and his co-conspirators have done, have attempted to do, and are continuing to do to our country.  That said – and subject to the caveat that outrage at the revelation of some particularly-egregious traitorous act may drive me to write – I plan to enter very little here about the evidence presented by the hearings, for reasons I expressed in a note in early January:

“The almost certain:  that the House … Committee … will [set] forth damning evidence showing that … former President Donald Trump and his traitorous cohort sought to overturn … a free and fair election and instigated the Capitol insurrection.  I believe that the political ramifications … will be … nil. … [T]hose citizens with – to paraphrase the Lord – eyes to see and ears to hear already know that Mr. Trump and his acolytes are guilty of sedition.  Those who willfully and steadfastly reject this fundamental and blatantly obvious truth will be unmoved by whatever the Committee brings forth.”

Noteworthy but not surprising is that many in the latter group won’t even see what the Committee brings forth, because Fox News – with its wide conservative audience – isn’t televising the hearings.  (I have seen one wag tweet that such failure is Fox claiming its Fifth Amendment right not to testify against itself.) 

In reviewing my earlier post, however, I do believe that the hearings might ultimately have some effect, to the benefit of Democrats and, ironically, “organization” Republicans such as Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell:  it may weaken Mr. Trump’s hold on sensible Republicans and conservative independents (who I think will watch some, if not all of the hearings), thereby widening what already seems be a developing schism between Trumplicans and those who wish to move on from him.  Any such schism will help Democrats in 2024, if not this year, and – for good or ill, and whether or not Democrats hold the White House in 2024 – facilitate the return of control of the Washington GOP to Mr. McConnell and party regulars.

Pal’-li-a-tive.  (Of a medicine or medical care) relieving pain without dealing with the cause of the condition.

• Oxford Languages

As all are aware, there were multiple incidents involving firearms across our nation this past weekend that met the Gun Violence Archive’s definition of a “mass shooting”:  four or more people shot (injured or killed) in a single incident, at the same general time and location, not including the shooter.  I was out of town, visiting with friends.  On several occasions, we visited public venues.  I don’t know how many of them glanced around, considered — and then, out of necessity, dismissed – the thought I had:  that if a shooter entered the premises while we were there, we had few avenues of escape.

It’s being reported that given the recent mass shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde, a bipartisan Senate Committee led by Democratic U.S. CT Sen. Chris Murphy and Republican U.S. TX Sen. John Cornyn is considering so-called “gun legislation.”  Sen. Murphy, an ardent advocate of gun control, has apparently indicated that any product of the bipartisan negotiation will NOT ban assault weaponry, expand background checks, or raise the age at which firearms can be purchased.  Republicans, reportedly, instead wish to emphasize school security and mental health measures.  One Wall Street Journal account has noted, “Many Democrats, worn down after repeated failures to advance new laws, have said they are willing to settle for even a small bipartisan deal.”

As all who care are aware, Sandy Hook Elementary School, the scene of the deadliest elementary school mass shooting – including 20 children between the ages 6 and 7 — is located in Mr. Murphy’s state of Connecticut.  He took his seat in the Senate in 2013, less than a month after the Sandy Hook massacre.  Throughout his time in the Senate, he has worked tirelessly – and tragically, fruitlessly — for effective American gun control measures.  No one can have anything but complete admiration for his efforts.

At the same time, even the most pressing issues with the most obvious solutions – a pandemic, or in this case, the unspeakable slaughter of innocents – now somehow become political.  I didn’t want to sully the recent posts relating to the Buffalo and Uvalde mass shootings with any reference to their political ramifications.  I would now submit that for Democrats, what the Republicans are apparently willing to enact – in the Journal’s words, “a small bipartisan deal” – is a sucker’s bet.  They seem likely to take it.  They shouldn’t.

As those that follow these pages are aware, I generally maintain an incrementalist philosophy toward legislation:  if you see that you don’t have the votes to get the whole loaf, take what you can get.  While I can’t dismiss the possibility that President Joe Biden acquiesced to a sweeping Democratic domestic legislative agenda in areas such as voting rights, immigration reform, and the “Build Back Better” initiative because such was necessary to maintain the support of his party’s avid progressive wing, if the so-called “Go Big” strategy was his choice – if he saw himself as either a Franklin Roosevelt or Lyndon Johnson – he may have squandered an opportunity during his first year in office to get small but popular measures passed, such as childcare relief and a path to legal status for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients.

Even so, in the area of gun control, I think that Democrats should refuse to settle for a measure that fails to address any of the currently unaddressed evident root causes of many of these massacres.  Such a measure will enable Republicans in swing areas to soften swing voters’ outrage at the GOP’s intransigence by allowing them to loudly proclaim that they “did something” while simultaneously maintaining the support of gun rights advocates.  Democrats should want the issue, in its rawest form, if all they can get is a palliative.  They should want certain voter segments, such as those suburban Republicans who in 2020, because they could no longer stomach former President Donald Trump, either voted for Mr. Biden, or didn’t vote at all, to remain acutely uncomfortable.  (Making a negotiation breakdown appear to be the Republicans’ doing should be simple; all it would take would be the introduction into the talks of a generally-popular provision, such as institution of universal background checks.)  If Democrats think that after a modest measure is passed, bringing more aggressive bills – to ban assault weapons, to impose universal background checks, etc., etc. — to the floors of the Houses of Congress and making Republicans vote against them will have any political value whatsoever, I fear that they’re kidding themselves.

A close friend recently called my attention to a Politico article (linked below) in which a number of professional politicians opine that gun control is not the type of campaign issue that will sway a determinative number of voters.  While this assessment is certainly true in deep- (perhaps better described as, “dead-”) red areas – and arguably gained credence when the Republican U.S. Congressman representing suburban Buffalo, Chris Jacobs, announced on June 3 that he would not seek re-election after facing backlash for indicating that he would support an assault weapons ban — I did note that the piece reports that a Global Strategy Group poll has found that 58% of registered suburban voters in swing states, including Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, support more restrictive gun laws.  If I was the Wisconsin Democratic U.S. Senate nominee running against Ron Johnson in a close election – and not expecting to garner any votes from ardent Republicans, as Mr. Jacobs needed to keep his seat – I’d rather have Mr. Johnson on the record as opposing all gun reform than enabling him to assuage the uneasiness of conservative independents and moderate Republican suburban women by asserting that he did indeed vote for a “gun law” — which, on a relative scale to what needs to be done, did precious little to protect our children, our grandchildren, or ourselves.

https://www.politico.com/news/2022/06/01/gun-control-debate-suburbs-elections-00036230?nname=playbook&nid=0000014f-1646-d88f-a1cf-5f46b7bd0000&nrid=00000171-35c5-dd63-a9fd-77d53c5e0000&nlid=630318

There were a number of thoughtful comments to this post, some entered on these pages, some provided through other means.  They warrant a postscript, since I remain unaware – and at this point, think I always will be unaware 😉 – how many that read these notes see the comments besides me.

It’s best at the outset to correct a couple of misimpressions I apparently inadvertently left with this post.  One observer suggested that by limiting the note’s focus to an assault weapons ban, I had failed to adequately reference our need to continue and enhance the ongoing activities by various public and private mental health agencies to identify and treat those who may be prone to contemplate undertaking a mass shooting.  Such was not my intent.  I have no doubt that we would be suffering even greater levels of carnage but for our mental health professionals’ dedicated efforts, and absolutely support increasing funding for this work.  An experienced and gifted mental health professional, while agreeing that we need more regulatory constraint on access to assault weapons, expressed a concern that my broad-brush reference to “crazies” in the post’s concluding paragraph had the potential to perpetuate stigmas about the mentally ill, the vast majority of whom are nonviolent and are more likely to be the victims than perpetrators of violence.  Again, I had no intent to reinforce false stereotypes.  The twin shocks of the Buffalo and Uvalde shootings, combined with my fervent belief regarding our need to restrain the manufacture, sale and use of assault weapons, caused me to overlook clarifications that I should have added to my assertions.

In the post, I noted that it had been reported the Uvalde shooter had been “engaged by law enforcement” before entering the school.  We now know he wasn’t, and that law enforcement took an interminable amount of time to meaningfully respond.  While the incompetence and/or cowardice of the law enforcement at Uvalde adds to the excruciating agony of the parents and the outrage of the rest of us, I fear that focus on the Uvalde law enforcement performance creates a distraction to enable gun rights apologists to deflect attention from the fact that the primary cause of this tragedy was that an 18-year-old could legally buy two assault weapons and a bunch of ammunition without effective legal restraint.  I do have a lot of sympathy for the vast majority of our law enforcement officials across this nation who would have run in to save these children – and are now undoubtedly concerned that the general public considers the rank-and-file officer not only racially-biased but an incompetent coward.  I would venture – and am pretty sure that most officers would agree — that if a cop isn’t willing to brave physical danger in these types of emergencies, s/he should find another line of work.

Some noted the sad practical political reality that Congress will do nothing significant to restrict access to and use of assault weapons (a comment on this below), while others urged a more aggressive limit on the right to firearms than I had proposed.  One loyal follower – a mother, nonviolent and quite progressive by nature — gently berated me for stopping short of a call for a ban on all firearms other than used by military and law enforcement, with offenders to be “fined, jailed, and kicked in the nuts.”  Although her sentiments are unlikely to find their way into American law and one of the consequences she proposes probably violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against the infliction of cruel and unusual punishment, I understand her visceral passion. 

At the same time, despite my earlier declaration that there is no “Why” to mass shootings, I have concluded that there is, indeed, a “Why” – not to any particular incident, but to why assault weapons have been allowed to proliferate within our nation although it is glaringly obvious that legally limiting our citizens’ access to such weapons would reduce the number and severity of such incidents.  In a sense, I’ve known for decades. 

Over 30 years ago, I attended a professional conference at a very posh Washington, D.C. hotel.  One morning, I called for room service, and soon my breakfast was delivered by an elderly, white-haired African American gentleman, twice my age, wearing formal tails with white gloves.  I felt very uncomfortable having him wait on me, and attempted to take the tray; he would have none of it, carried it into the room, pulled out a sideboard that I hadn’t even seen, motioned for me to sit, arranged the tray in front of me, put the napkin on my lap.  I had never been waited on like that, and was a bit unnerved by it.  Being a political junkie and sitting in a D.C. hotel room, it occurred to me soon after he departed why so many of our representatives strive so hard to hang onto their jobs.  While Messrs. Ted Kennedy and Herb Kohl (then in the Senate), rich men, would receive such service for the rest of their lives, a member of Congress of average means served as I had just been was likely to transition from initial discomfort, to liking it, to expecting it, to, finally, fearing being deprived of it – terrified of no longer being Cinderella, of having his/her carriage turn into a pumpkin … to having to return to living just like the rest of us.

Lately, I’ve been rereading essays in The Federalist.  As Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay, taking turns as “Publius,” sought to persuade Americans to support ratification of the new Constitution, their essays turn time and again to the concept of checks and balances.  “Ambition must be made to counteract ambition,” Mr. Madison observed in “Federalist No. 51.”  Put aside for a moment current perspectives of privilege and diversity; it is clear from reading The Federalist that all three authors implicitly assumed that anyone elected to Congress would already be prominent; he wouldn’t seek office primarily to become prominent.  Powerful men don’t countenance having their prerogatives trampled.  Mr. Jay stated it most directly in “Federalist No. 3”:  “When once an efficient national government is established, the best men in the country will not only consent to serve, but also will generally be appointed to manage it … [a] general and extensive reputation for talents and other qualifications will be necessary to recommend men to offices under the national government ….”

In the aftermath of Uvalde, a PBS NewsHour correspondent reported that he had asked Republican U.S. ND Sen. Kevin Cramer about the prospects of the Senate enacting gun control legislation, and Sen. Cramer, while acknowledging gun control advocates’ concerns, intimated that supporting such legislation would have a significant adverse impact on his career.  Republican U.S. LA Sen. Bill Cassidy, when asked about assault weapons regulation, responded, “If you talk to the people that own [an AR-15], killing feral pigs in the middle of Louisiana, they wonder why you would take it away from them.  [They say,] ‘I’m law-abiding, I’ve never done anything, I use it to kill feral pigs.  The action of a criminal deprives me of my right.’”

One could infer from the report of Mr. Cramer’s comments that he will not support significant gun control legislation due to potential political repercussions, although he perhaps well sees a need for it.  Mr. Cassidy is a physician.  He clearly possesses discernment — it should fairly be noted, he was one of a few Republican Senators with the courage to vote to convict former President Donald Trump in his last Senate impeachment trial – and he can’t help, as one who presumably subscribes to the Hippocratic Oath, but to privately understand that citing his constituents’ need for assault weapons to shoot feral pigs is an absurd ground upon which to rationalize the failure to limit Americans’ access to war weapons that have destroyed an unconscionable number of innocent human lives in a matter of seconds.     

While Republican legislators should be removed who sincerely hold that largely unfettered gun rights for Americans supersede the need to protect the public from unprovoked mass gun attacks, I feel no anger toward them; they simply lack the capacity to think critically.  What I find despicable are the Republican legislators whom I truly believe make up their majority – avowed “conservatives” — who recognize that meaningful assault weapon regulation would save lives, and yet fail to act out of political self-preservation.  We rightly criticize any police officers ultimately proven to have failed to act to protect children because they feared for their lives – since they understood when donning the badge that such risks were part of the job – but we seem too ready to accept at face value the notion that legislators who know better – successors to men who pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor to found a nation — are somehow justified in failing to limit ongoing mortal danger to Americans because they want to protect their hallowed positions. 

As I’ve previously noted in these pages, Eighteenth Century Anglo-Irish Statesman Edmund Burke, ironically considered one of the founding fathers of modern conservative thought, once declared to his Parliament constituents: 

“[A representative’s] unbiased opinion, his mature judgment, his enlightened conscience, he ought not to sacrifice to you, to any man, or to any set of men living.  Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion.”

So on this issue, as with others, there is a “Why,” the root rot of the troubles we face:  we are subject to the Tyranny of Cowardice.

On April 19, 2022, MI State Sen. Mallory McMorrow, describing herself as a “straight, white, Christian, married, suburban Mom,” having been attacked by a Republican adversary for “grooming and sexualizing children,” took to the floor of the Michigan State Senate and delivered a blistering response to the attack that proceeded to go viral.  You may well have already seen it.  A link to a YouTube video of her speech is set forth below.

On April 30, 2022, The New York Times published a detailed article on the manner and messages of Fox News Channel Commentator Tucker Carlson.  Mr. Carlson is apparently the highest-rated host on cable news channels.  (It appears from the report that Mr. Carlson’s audience is almost exclusively white and “overwhelmingly” older.)  I have neither the strength of stomach nor sufficient remaining life space to devote attention to Mr. Carlson’s broadcasts, and thus, cannot independently vouch for the veracity of the Times’ account; with that disclaimer, the gist of the Times article seems to align with numerous other reports I have seen of Mr. Carlson’s program over the last several years.  (Mr. Carlson has reportedly relished rather than disputed the Times report.)  A link to the online version of the Times piece is also set forth below; hopefully, you can access it.

The Times indicates (and demonstrates through video) that Mr. Carlson frequently makes use of a “You – They” dichotomy in his monologues:  You for his viewers, and They for those he calls the “Ruling Class” that he claims seeks to denigrate, among others, whites and men:  the Ruling Class that hates You, that wants to control You, that wants to replace You with malleable (colored) immigrants.  Feeding fear and dissatisfaction has made his ratings go higher and higher (arguably akin to setting up a salt lick for deer hunting).  (I did find it particularly cruelly hypocritical for Mr. Carlson to call the Mainstream Media a “Propaganda Machine” for describing the January 6 Capitol uprising as an “insurrection,” when it is patently obvious to anybody with at least one eye that the riot was, indeed, a Trumplican insurrection.)

Sen. McMorrow’s remarks and the Times’ report of Mr. Carlson’s premises have caused me to revisit reflections I’ve had since the political rise of former President Donald Trump upon the contradictions implicit in the way that the political alt-right views some of those who do not adhere to its views.

Sen. McMorrow clearly thinks enough of public service to have placed herself in the political arena.  TLOML and I have been voting and paying taxes for longer than Ms. McMorrow has been alive, have held down jobs, attended town halls, church socials, and parent-teacher meetings, coached Little League and led Brownie Troops.  We shovel our snow and mow our lawn (sometimes, we even fertilize).  Like Ms. McMorrow, we are straight, white, Christian, married, and parents.  (We are also grandparents.)  [I do fit in the “overwhelming older” segment of the Fox audience 😉 ].  By these measures, all three of us are presumably upstanding Fox Nation Real Americans.

That said, while I feel no guilt about being white, I certainly don’t feel under attack because of it; it’s pretty obvious that at least in America, it’s easier to be white than not.  Although white birth rates are declining, I have yet to hear of any white couples who say that they have had fewer children than they wished because immigrants of other colors invaded their homes and forcibly kept them apart.  I feel no threat from those of other races and ethnicities attempting to get ahead; this is America.  (I favor equal treatment, not favoritism – in either direction.)  I don’t feel under attack because I’m straight; again, in America, and I suspect in just about everywhere else in the world, it’s easier to be straight than not.  If those of other gender and sexual orientations find solace in expressions that seem unusual to me, I don’t see how such harms me.  (I find the notion that “unconventional” gender and sexual orientations are not inherent, but rather, can be “taught,” to be – stated tactfully – misguided.)  I don’t feel that my Christian faith is succumbing to non-Christian elements; even aside from my personal belief that Christianity is but one of many paths to the Almighty, of one thing I’m absolutely certain:  He (please excuse the male pronoun) can take care of Himself.  On top of that, I’m male.  Again, I feel no guilt about it, but certainly don’t feel threatened because of it.  I don’t think that any foreigner has stolen any of my testosterone.  If any of Mr. Carlson’s male viewers feel so endangered by the advance of women in our society that they would prefer to be female – and assume the burdens of dealing with oblivious males, conflicting societal expectations, etc., etc. — the line forms to the right. While Mr. Carlson is absolutely correct that those in our country with greater opportunities have frequently exploited those with fewer advantages, I would also suggest that some who focus on their disadvantages refuse to recognize that they didn’t always see or seize the opportunities available to them to better their situations. 

Sen. McMorrow is one state legislator in one state’s legislature.  I have been rereading approvingly – ever more so as the alt-right intensity has seemingly increased since the 2020 election — The Federalist articles of Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay and the discourses of John Locke and Winston Churchill – odes to the “Western Civilization” that Mr. Carlson claims to be under siege.  Even so, neither Ms. McMorrow nor I look like the “Ruling Class” to me.  Despite Mr. Carlson’s rants, I don’t hate – and sincerely doubt she hates — the ordinary Carlson viewer.  I don’t wish – and sincerely doubt she wishes — to control the ordinary Carlson viewer.  I don’t want – and sincerely doubt she wants — to replace the ordinary Carlson viewer.  We simply believe that the promise of America embraces more than a single race, a single gender preference, a single faith.

So where do she and I fit within the Alt-Right Compass, given our Whiteness, our Straightness, our Christianity, our Good Citizenship, and the fact that we obviously don’t rule anybody?

Sen. McMorrow called it in her speech, either deliberately or inadvertently invoking Mr. Carlson’s framework:  “[Because I have a different view than my Republican adversary] … you dehumanize and marginalize me … I am one of them.”

In his book, Anti-Pluralism, William Galston quotes Mr. Trump as saying at a May, 2016, rally:  “The only important thing is the unification of the people … the other people don’t mean anything.  [Emphasis Added]”  In Foxconned – a book given me by a close friend detailing the Republican-fostered Wisconsin debacle that merits more extensive treatment in these pages before the 2022 elections — Lawrence Tabak quotes former WI Gov. Scott Walker as saying that it was a “flawed argument” that “a vote in [progressive] Madison [where TLOML and I reside] counts the same as a vote in a very rural community or in a suburban community.”

So it’s not enough even if one is, demographically, what the alt-right claims to appreciate.  Those that don’t think like they do can’t “mean anything,” their votes can’t “count,” elections lost by alt-right candidates must be “stolen” … because good people wrapping themselves in rhetoric such as Mr. Carlson’s would otherwise have to admit, even to themselves, that they no longer believe in democracy.