Ruy had a list of hills the Democrats shouldn't die on. They seem to be defending all of them.
As for Musk, some of us are old enough to remember Clinton and Gore eliminating 400,000 jobs, the Grace Commission and BRAC.
How about the Democrats cooperate with the effort to right size the Pentagon. They could even make it their special project. Truman was an obscure Senator until he undertook a project to root out fraud there during WW2.
How can anyone trust a political party that is dying on the hill of allowing male athletes to play against females in sports? That is all three strikes in one swing, because we KNOW they are lying and gaslighting us. I will not vote for ANY politician who lies to my face and says that male athletes have no biological advantages over female athletes, or that there are more than two biological sexes (what is that third sex? They never tell us). To vote for the Dems right now would be like voting for a party that says the moon is made out of green cheese. NO! Stop lying, pandering, and insulting normal people if you want our votes. Until then: MAGA.
It is because we no longer have a Democratic Party. It has become the Progressive party and if moderate people (like we are and like you seem to be) express views that Progressives don't like they are attacked mercilessly.
As a psychologist, I know how bad the research on trans issues is regarding youth, and that biological males have incredible advantages. I have read all of the relevant studies. My wife and I are parents to a world class female athlete. We dread a trans woman trying to beat her Guinness record, because he could. If her record is broken by a biological women, we, along with our daughter, will celebrate her. But a man? So, it's very real for us.
It's pretty public, but I really appreciate your thinking about that issue. She ran 32 miles (50K) every day for 200 straight days. In running those 32 miles she could not take more than a 5 minute break.
(previous record was something like 17).
And then after those 200 straight days, she "cooled down" by running a marathon.
sorta, kinda proud, and still sorta kinda in disbelief.
Yes it is, and how ironic that you claim Trump lies constantly while deceiving yourself, IMO, on a much more impactful truth. Denying that there are only 2 sexes, that one can change their sex and that males should not compete and occupy female spaces is a fundamental lie, a civilization crushing lie, again, IMO. Why? Because you are supporting the confusion of our immature youth. You are teaching our youth that everything is relative, that there is no such thing as absolute truth. Where can this lead? For just one example, the child who is taught that there are no absolute truths is unlikely to stand up to evil, because that would be denying someone else's 'truth'. So, when they discuss the murder of the innocent, they don't call it evil, therefore, they are likely to have no problem showing no conviction to oppose it.
IMO, 'this small number of athletes' represents one of the biggest issues of our times, whether one believes in truth, or believes in 'your truth'. I'll go with the Bible. And excuse me, sincerely, if my approach here is taken as rude, I'm just very passionate about this topic, God bless.
It wasn't only inflation that drove voters to Trump. It was a panopoly of issues including the border, government spending, taxes, gender insanity, lawfare, threats to the Supreme Court among others.
Mr. Bahaareen writes: 'Insofar as the party is forming a plan to counter him over the next two to four years, it seems to mostly be a rerun of his first term, when they spent an inordinate amount of time trying to convince America not to “normalize” Trump and that he was a “threat to democracy.”'
That's the comic book version. Even though Trump won 30 of 50 states, Democrats determined they were not going to let him govern. They tried to set him up with a fake Russia Collusion charge (in other words, treason) and later staged a fake impeachment. They blamed him for covid when it was their bureaucratic edicts that created serious and long-term problems across the country. They immediately imposed a campaign of lawfare against those who might want to work for Trump, then later against Trump himself. In short, they engaged in subversion and duplicity to make it impossible for him to govern effectively.
Now that Trump has won convincingly and the public has tired of Democrat machinations, the author and others are calling on Democrats to formulate new policies. To do that with any degree of success, they will have to abandon most of their old policies and behaviors and make amends. It's going to take time and I doubt they can do it before the 2026 mid-terms.
***"Even though Trump won 30 of 50 states, Democrats determined they were not going to let him govern."***
Unfortunately, this norm was set in the prior 8 years, when Republicans staged a 'massive resistance' campaign against Obama's attempt to govern.(https://www.politico.com/story/2010/10/the-gops-no-compromise-pledge-044311) The most charitable interpretation is that it's a function of political polarization, which is a bipartisan phenomenon, but nonetheless once a norm is set by one administration, it is likely to be used by the next.
***They tried to set him up with a fake Russia Collusion charge (in other words, treason) and later staged a fake impeachment.***
There was collusion, the Mueller Report makes this clear--it was not a 'fake' charge, that's just plainly false. The collusion was just not as egregious as one would expect it to be given the size of the media circus. The media hysteria made it seem bigger than it was, and that's a legitimate criticism, they shouldn't have done that--but to say it was 'fake' is false.
***and later staged a fake impeachment***
Even if you don't think the collusion impeachment was warranted, the January 20th impeachment was 100% warranted, given what we knew at the time but even *more* so given what we know now.
***In short, they engaged in subversion and duplicity to make it impossible for him to govern effectively.***
And this is why you don't want to normalize things. They simply tried to slow down and gum up his agenda the way their predecessors had tried to slow down and gum up theirs in the past. Think of what they now have precedent to do when a Democratic president gets back into power, given how we're normalizing Trump's latest antics. I mean, we're greenlighting some *really really really* bad ones.
"President X, how dare you encourage radicals to physically attack lawmakers who refuse to abide by your agenda, and then pardon them! That's blatant authoritarianism!"
"Tough. I won the 2028 election...and I have precedent."
Did Republicans try and frame Obama on a treason charge?
Did they impeach him for doing his duty as the leader of our foreign policy?
Democrats did a lot more than try and gum up his agenda. They waged lawfare against a number of Trump's employees and then against Trump himself to try and prevent his candidacy in 2024. That was pure banana republic fascism.
The impeachment for J6 was a travesty. Trump truly believed the election was stolen and as president, he was trying to stop the process and throw the election into the House, which, as the executor of our laws, he had the right to do. He wanted the House to investigate charges of electoral fraud of which there were many. Although there was a lot of fraud, I do not think it changed the outcome. But it should be investigated in the same way Jimmy Carter and James Baker investigated the 2000 election because Democrats thought it had been stolen.
The fact is the Democrats imposed heinous regulations and restrictions on the population during covid and then blamed Trump for all the problems they themselves had caused. Then they had their stormtroopers riot in the streets for 5 months to make it look like the country was in chaos. Democrat mayors could have stopped those riots in nearly every major city at any time but they refused because they thought it was politically beneficial. Then, as soon as the election was over, the riots ceased. That was not a coincidence.
Your party is morally, politically, intellectually and cultrually crippled and it's going to take a long time to fix it.
***Did Republicans try and frame Obama on a treason charge?***
Trump was never charged with treason.
***Did they impeach him for doing his duty as the leader of our foreign policy?***
No, but the Democrats didn't impeach Trump for that either so...?
***The impeachment for J6 was a travesty. Trump truly believed the election was stolen and as president, he was trying to stop the process and throw the election into the House, which, as the executor of our laws, he had the right to do.***
He'd already pursued these claims in the courts, and had been unable to get any of them to stick. Judges looked at the evidence and concluded that he didn't have anything substantiating his claims. Then, when he ran out of legal avenues, he pursued illegal ones--the least of which was going to the Capitol and trying to stop the counting of the votes, (inciting a riot along the way) without any legal authority to do so. (That is what he was impeached for, but we now know from the Smith indictment that he did *much* more than that)
To say that throwing out the legal result of an election through extra-legal means *isn't* insurrection would imply that elections don't matter at all, and if a sitting president wishes to retain power, he need only claim an election was fraudulent and demand the electoral votes cease to be counted. Since the form of the government of the United States is a *Republic*, where the executive is *elected*, that claim makes no sense. At all.
***Your party is morally, politically, intellectually and cultrually crippled and it's going to take a long time to fix it.***
I'm not wedded to either party--though obviously there is one I favor over the other--but there's only one right now that refused to pivot and back a candidate *other* than the one who tried to overthrow the Republic.
Though I don't agree with many of your takes Minsky, I do appreciate your respectful approach. Mixing it up, in a dutiful manner, which you emulate, is what makes America good and vibrant. God bless
The Biden and Obama administrations turned the Federal Government into a WPA for liberal activists, usually under the rubric of DEI. Of course they had every right to do this.
That said, there is no law that requires a Republican President to continue to use taxpayer funds to prop up his opposition.
In his interview with Joe Rogan, Trump reflected on his naivete regarding political appointments and the Federal Bureaucracy. He isn't going to repeat the mistakes of his first administration.
I tend to be careful with Harris polls. They've been under scrutiny from people across the political spectrum for some time re: their methodologies and accusations of bias (i.e., that their polls are designed to elicit politically convenient responses rather than an accurate reflection of reality).
To add to Mr. Baharaeen's comment, 'very popular among Americans' implies popularity across partisan lines, and there is no indication of bipartisan support. Given the way polling now moves even on supposedly 'objective' issues like the economy, I think one could easily say that DOGE is very popular with Republicans, very unpopular with Democrats, that there is very little middle-ground, and that one would have excellent grounds to speculate that if it were a Democratic initiative being headed up by Kamala Harris and Soros (or Gates, or [insert billionaire affiliated with Democrats]), the numbers would flip and it would suddenly be *very* unpopular with Republicans and popular with Democrats.
However, there *is* a grain of truth you're getting at, which you can see in polling on the issues one could argue is associated with the *concept of DOGE*--particularly Americans' opinions about government waste--where we do indeed see bipartisan support. (i.e., polling indicates solid majorities of Americans believe the government could be less wasteful) So, once again, the question seems to be how you take partisan polarization out of the equation--unfortunately, I find little reason to believe the current iteration of DOGE will do that. I wouldn't put a future, less divisively organized iteration out of the realm of possibility, though, if we somehow see a reversal in political polarization. So far, sadly, there is none in sight.
I don't think there is anything or anyone that is popular across partisan lines. There are some that are unpopular across partisan lines, like Mitch McConnel but that is different. So the dynamic needs to change. I suggest populist vs Establishment. The populist term is normally applied to MAGA but there are plenty of leftists that the term could be appropriately applied to, like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. There is too much distrust right now to really get a systemic fix but an issue by issue approach seems feasible. How about right sizing the Pentagon.
Here are two big reasons to be cautious about "Deficit hawk" approach to victory: It almost never, ever worked for Republicans. Democrats always used it to hike taxes. Well, MAGA won't go along with that. Homey don't play tax hikes. Second, Democrats have MASSIVE image rebuilding and it's more than woke. For example, in the Harvard poll that has Trump at 53% (Baris has him at 53+%), some 52% of the public think Democrats let in millions of illegals deliberately. That's big.
INFLATION: When did it start? During the crazy covid pandemic era with the supply chain disruptions and checks in the mail. ( Democrats, can we talk about authoritarian government and "unprecedented" actions by executives and unelected officials?)
DOGE: I am not so comfortable with unelected billionaires playing a major role in governance. BUT Democrats would have a stronger case if Bill Gates hadn't been extremely influential in pandemic preparedness and vaccination policy for 20 years. Btw, these two areas go together!
Soros had too much influence on criminal justice, electing and training AG and DA positions all over the country. Omidyar and Reid Hoffmen were financing on line "misinformation" observatory projects. See Taibbis work on censorship industrial complex. At least Elon is out in the open!
Further comment on DOGE. Cleaning up and auding the governement clearly needed to be done, why wasn't it done before?
It is hard to come up with up with any Democrat leadership name that doesn’t turn my stomach. Raskin is one of the worse. What this means to me is that the Dems need to find a voice that hasn’t tainted themself with the Dem’s irrational and childish behavior since Trump 1. As an independent, it seems to be ridiculous to care what polls say today. I believe what Trump said was, drill baby drill was the answer to inflation. Trump realistically has two years. His first 30 days bode well. Sometimes the only way to rebuild a corrupt system is after you totally dismantle it. It would be a waste of time to try and pick and choose employees from USAID to keep. Partial it out and find less ideological employees who don’t think they alone have the power to represent our country to others. Musk is a bull in a China shop. However, if an employee works from an office, they don’t need to justify job performance. The boss sees it every day. When they come back from the field, verbal briefings or written reports, usually both, are given to the higher ups. Why do those who work at home think the standards apply to them?
She was yelling at Hegseth for being unqualified. Some of the people opposing him on this basis seem to want Robert McNamara back. He certainly had experience running a large organization. I don't remember him fondly at Ford, the DoD or the World Bank.
You mean the alcoholic? This is the best Republicans and America can do for its highest military position? She had every right to yell at him for being unqualified.
There are a variety of reasons one could dislike him but what she was yelling about was his lack of experience running a large organization. Like McNamara.
For Democrats to become popular again, they would have to adopt most of Trump's platform, eject the radical woke cohort, and be more clear-spoken caring effeminate (vs raging academic effeminate) in their word delivery. Good luck with that as any candidate meeting these qualification will be ripped to shreds by the academic-spoken raging effeminates controlling the party apparatus.
Question about the inflation comment re gas prices - they are down here in Virginia, not up. Is it different elsewhere? Average pump price is 2.99 in VA per radio news this am, and the gas station I passed this morning was at 2.89. Unless my memory is incorrect, it was over 3.00 last month.
Eggs are going to be expensive until bird flu wanes. There is a vaccine for chickens, but it’s not sterilizing and there has been concern that it can result in undetected carrier birds. There is also a shortage of chicks from hatcheries.
Having a good vision is having an inspiring vision. Nothing in this article suggests anything close to an inspirational idea. And as a rural voter the biggest thing that I look for that may impact inflation is the price of gas and it is dropping very low. When I look up what could be a cause one thing cited is the chance of peace in the Ukraine. If this holds Trump is going to get a lot of credit
I think an under-the-radar opportunity will be capitalizing on the damage the tariffs are going to do to the auto-industry.
Autoworkers are not going to be happy that Trump is scrambling their supply chains--which are heavily integrated with Canada and Mexico's auto industries--just as they were finishing repairing the damage COVID did to them. Making a lively, theatrical defense of those workers' livelihoods part of the Democratic platform, as Trump undermines them in favor of handing out more tax cuts for capital, will help in putting Democrats back in working class people's favor.
Also, a big asset for the Democrats right now is the overconfidence of the GOP and MAGA. It reeks of Democratic overconfidence circa 2012-2016--and overconfident political parties make mistakes. Oftentimes big ones.
James Carville has it right. Do not respond to every Trump provocation. Wait until the honeymoon ends which may be soon and probably no later than memorial day. The Republicans have so far been unified in their "duck and cover" routine but that will end as they need to pass a budget and extend the debt ceiling.
I retired after teaching at the college level for 30 years. BRAG ALERT: I got the top course ratings in my department year after year.
This is what I did. I showed videos. Now, I didn't just pop a video in and watch it for the entire class period. Instead, I would lecture over concepts for the first 30-40 minutes, and then show a video that illustrated my points with real-life examples.
Democrats should do this. Don't go on and on about threats to Democracy, DOGE being bad.
Do an ad of Trump attacking inflation, then show photos of gas prices last November and now. Do an ad on a real person, a real Trump voter, who is being hurt by DOGE.
DON'T LECTURE OVER CONCEPTS. Show people the reality.
p.s. I also got top course ratings because I was tough. I took attendance. I gave a quiz over the chapters BEFORE I lectured over them to stop cramming for exams.
But making the ideas real was the main thing. Students would sit up and watch them, and then I could make the points using a real live person.
MAKE IT ALIVE. MAKE IT ABOUT PEOPLE, NOT CONCEPTS DEMOCRATS.
So East Coast and Gulf Coast are down from last week, and East Coast, Midwest, and Gulf Coast are down from a year ago. Lots of swing states there. Probably need to wait until their prices go up to hit on price.
Actually, my point was about using real matters instead of hypothetical ones to connect with people. Gas prices were an example, but if they aren't, no big deal. Just deal with real ones.
Ruy had a list of hills the Democrats shouldn't die on. They seem to be defending all of them.
As for Musk, some of us are old enough to remember Clinton and Gore eliminating 400,000 jobs, the Grace Commission and BRAC.
How about the Democrats cooperate with the effort to right size the Pentagon. They could even make it their special project. Truman was an obscure Senator until he undertook a project to root out fraud there during WW2.
When I was a kid, the Democrats defended free speech and wanted to shrink the Pentagon. Now it is the reverse.
How can anyone trust a political party that is dying on the hill of allowing male athletes to play against females in sports? That is all three strikes in one swing, because we KNOW they are lying and gaslighting us. I will not vote for ANY politician who lies to my face and says that male athletes have no biological advantages over female athletes, or that there are more than two biological sexes (what is that third sex? They never tell us). To vote for the Dems right now would be like voting for a party that says the moon is made out of green cheese. NO! Stop lying, pandering, and insulting normal people if you want our votes. Until then: MAGA.
It is because we no longer have a Democratic Party. It has become the Progressive party and if moderate people (like we are and like you seem to be) express views that Progressives don't like they are attacked mercilessly.
As a psychologist, I know how bad the research on trans issues is regarding youth, and that biological males have incredible advantages. I have read all of the relevant studies. My wife and I are parents to a world class female athlete. We dread a trans woman trying to beat her Guinness record, because he could. If her record is broken by a biological women, we, along with our daughter, will celebrate her. But a man? So, it's very real for us.
I'd love to know what Guinness record she holds, but I understand if you don't want to give out her identity. Excellent comments!
It's pretty public, but I really appreciate your thinking about that issue. She ran 32 miles (50K) every day for 200 straight days. In running those 32 miles she could not take more than a 5 minute break.
(previous record was something like 17).
And then after those 200 straight days, she "cooled down" by running a marathon.
sorta, kinda proud, and still sorta kinda in disbelief.
Penny, is this small number of athletes really more important than the constant lying Trump does daily across issues that threaten our democracy?
Yes it is, and how ironic that you claim Trump lies constantly while deceiving yourself, IMO, on a much more impactful truth. Denying that there are only 2 sexes, that one can change their sex and that males should not compete and occupy female spaces is a fundamental lie, a civilization crushing lie, again, IMO. Why? Because you are supporting the confusion of our immature youth. You are teaching our youth that everything is relative, that there is no such thing as absolute truth. Where can this lead? For just one example, the child who is taught that there are no absolute truths is unlikely to stand up to evil, because that would be denying someone else's 'truth'. So, when they discuss the murder of the innocent, they don't call it evil, therefore, they are likely to have no problem showing no conviction to oppose it.
IMO, 'this small number of athletes' represents one of the biggest issues of our times, whether one believes in truth, or believes in 'your truth'. I'll go with the Bible. And excuse me, sincerely, if my approach here is taken as rude, I'm just very passionate about this topic, God bless.
Well said Penny!
It wasn't only inflation that drove voters to Trump. It was a panopoly of issues including the border, government spending, taxes, gender insanity, lawfare, threats to the Supreme Court among others.
Mr. Bahaareen writes: 'Insofar as the party is forming a plan to counter him over the next two to four years, it seems to mostly be a rerun of his first term, when they spent an inordinate amount of time trying to convince America not to “normalize” Trump and that he was a “threat to democracy.”'
That's the comic book version. Even though Trump won 30 of 50 states, Democrats determined they were not going to let him govern. They tried to set him up with a fake Russia Collusion charge (in other words, treason) and later staged a fake impeachment. They blamed him for covid when it was their bureaucratic edicts that created serious and long-term problems across the country. They immediately imposed a campaign of lawfare against those who might want to work for Trump, then later against Trump himself. In short, they engaged in subversion and duplicity to make it impossible for him to govern effectively.
Now that Trump has won convincingly and the public has tired of Democrat machinations, the author and others are calling on Democrats to formulate new policies. To do that with any degree of success, they will have to abandon most of their old policies and behaviors and make amends. It's going to take time and I doubt they can do it before the 2026 mid-terms.
***"Even though Trump won 30 of 50 states, Democrats determined they were not going to let him govern."***
Unfortunately, this norm was set in the prior 8 years, when Republicans staged a 'massive resistance' campaign against Obama's attempt to govern.(https://www.politico.com/story/2010/10/the-gops-no-compromise-pledge-044311) The most charitable interpretation is that it's a function of political polarization, which is a bipartisan phenomenon, but nonetheless once a norm is set by one administration, it is likely to be used by the next.
***They tried to set him up with a fake Russia Collusion charge (in other words, treason) and later staged a fake impeachment.***
There was collusion, the Mueller Report makes this clear--it was not a 'fake' charge, that's just plainly false. The collusion was just not as egregious as one would expect it to be given the size of the media circus. The media hysteria made it seem bigger than it was, and that's a legitimate criticism, they shouldn't have done that--but to say it was 'fake' is false.
***and later staged a fake impeachment***
Even if you don't think the collusion impeachment was warranted, the January 20th impeachment was 100% warranted, given what we knew at the time but even *more* so given what we know now.
***In short, they engaged in subversion and duplicity to make it impossible for him to govern effectively.***
And this is why you don't want to normalize things. They simply tried to slow down and gum up his agenda the way their predecessors had tried to slow down and gum up theirs in the past. Think of what they now have precedent to do when a Democratic president gets back into power, given how we're normalizing Trump's latest antics. I mean, we're greenlighting some *really really really* bad ones.
"President X, how dare you encourage radicals to physically attack lawmakers who refuse to abide by your agenda, and then pardon them! That's blatant authoritarianism!"
"Tough. I won the 2028 election...and I have precedent."
Did Republicans try and frame Obama on a treason charge?
Did they impeach him for doing his duty as the leader of our foreign policy?
Democrats did a lot more than try and gum up his agenda. They waged lawfare against a number of Trump's employees and then against Trump himself to try and prevent his candidacy in 2024. That was pure banana republic fascism.
The impeachment for J6 was a travesty. Trump truly believed the election was stolen and as president, he was trying to stop the process and throw the election into the House, which, as the executor of our laws, he had the right to do. He wanted the House to investigate charges of electoral fraud of which there were many. Although there was a lot of fraud, I do not think it changed the outcome. But it should be investigated in the same way Jimmy Carter and James Baker investigated the 2000 election because Democrats thought it had been stolen.
The fact is the Democrats imposed heinous regulations and restrictions on the population during covid and then blamed Trump for all the problems they themselves had caused. Then they had their stormtroopers riot in the streets for 5 months to make it look like the country was in chaos. Democrat mayors could have stopped those riots in nearly every major city at any time but they refused because they thought it was politically beneficial. Then, as soon as the election was over, the riots ceased. That was not a coincidence.
Your party is morally, politically, intellectually and cultrually crippled and it's going to take a long time to fix it.
***Did Republicans try and frame Obama on a treason charge?***
Trump was never charged with treason.
***Did they impeach him for doing his duty as the leader of our foreign policy?***
No, but the Democrats didn't impeach Trump for that either so...?
***The impeachment for J6 was a travesty. Trump truly believed the election was stolen and as president, he was trying to stop the process and throw the election into the House, which, as the executor of our laws, he had the right to do.***
He'd already pursued these claims in the courts, and had been unable to get any of them to stick. Judges looked at the evidence and concluded that he didn't have anything substantiating his claims. Then, when he ran out of legal avenues, he pursued illegal ones--the least of which was going to the Capitol and trying to stop the counting of the votes, (inciting a riot along the way) without any legal authority to do so. (That is what he was impeached for, but we now know from the Smith indictment that he did *much* more than that)
To say that throwing out the legal result of an election through extra-legal means *isn't* insurrection would imply that elections don't matter at all, and if a sitting president wishes to retain power, he need only claim an election was fraudulent and demand the electoral votes cease to be counted. Since the form of the government of the United States is a *Republic*, where the executive is *elected*, that claim makes no sense. At all.
***Your party is morally, politically, intellectually and cultrually crippled and it's going to take a long time to fix it.***
I'm not wedded to either party--though obviously there is one I favor over the other--but there's only one right now that refused to pivot and back a candidate *other* than the one who tried to overthrow the Republic.
The judges didn't look at the evidence. They ruled too soon, too late or no standing.
Though I don't agree with many of your takes Minsky, I do appreciate your respectful approach. Mixing it up, in a dutiful manner, which you emulate, is what makes America good and vibrant. God bless
The Biden and Obama administrations turned the Federal Government into a WPA for liberal activists, usually under the rubric of DEI. Of course they had every right to do this.
That said, there is no law that requires a Republican President to continue to use taxpayer funds to prop up his opposition.
In his interview with Joe Rogan, Trump reflected on his naivete regarding political appointments and the Federal Bureaucracy. He isn't going to repeat the mistakes of his first administration.
“DOGE is broadly unpopular.”
This doesn’t jive with the recent Hard CAPS/Harris poll out yesterday showing that DOGE is in fact very popular among Americans.
I tend to be careful with Harris polls. They've been under scrutiny from people across the political spectrum for some time re: their methodologies and accusations of bias (i.e., that their polls are designed to elicit politically convenient responses rather than an accurate reflection of reality).
https://www.semafor.com/article/12/19/2023/mark-penns-harvard-poll-is-driving-coverage-of-israel-but-should-it
To add to Mr. Baharaeen's comment, 'very popular among Americans' implies popularity across partisan lines, and there is no indication of bipartisan support. Given the way polling now moves even on supposedly 'objective' issues like the economy, I think one could easily say that DOGE is very popular with Republicans, very unpopular with Democrats, that there is very little middle-ground, and that one would have excellent grounds to speculate that if it were a Democratic initiative being headed up by Kamala Harris and Soros (or Gates, or [insert billionaire affiliated with Democrats]), the numbers would flip and it would suddenly be *very* unpopular with Republicans and popular with Democrats.
However, there *is* a grain of truth you're getting at, which you can see in polling on the issues one could argue is associated with the *concept of DOGE*--particularly Americans' opinions about government waste--where we do indeed see bipartisan support. (i.e., polling indicates solid majorities of Americans believe the government could be less wasteful) So, once again, the question seems to be how you take partisan polarization out of the equation--unfortunately, I find little reason to believe the current iteration of DOGE will do that. I wouldn't put a future, less divisively organized iteration out of the realm of possibility, though, if we somehow see a reversal in political polarization. So far, sadly, there is none in sight.
I don't think there is anything or anyone that is popular across partisan lines. There are some that are unpopular across partisan lines, like Mitch McConnel but that is different. So the dynamic needs to change. I suggest populist vs Establishment. The populist term is normally applied to MAGA but there are plenty of leftists that the term could be appropriately applied to, like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. There is too much distrust right now to really get a systemic fix but an issue by issue approach seems feasible. How about right sizing the Pentagon.
Here are two big reasons to be cautious about "Deficit hawk" approach to victory: It almost never, ever worked for Republicans. Democrats always used it to hike taxes. Well, MAGA won't go along with that. Homey don't play tax hikes. Second, Democrats have MASSIVE image rebuilding and it's more than woke. For example, in the Harvard poll that has Trump at 53% (Baris has him at 53+%), some 52% of the public think Democrats let in millions of illegals deliberately. That's big.
"some 52% of the public think Democrats let in millions of illegals deliberately. That's big."
It was a gambit to turn Texas purple. If they could pull it off, they would never lose another Presidential election.
INFLATION: When did it start? During the crazy covid pandemic era with the supply chain disruptions and checks in the mail. ( Democrats, can we talk about authoritarian government and "unprecedented" actions by executives and unelected officials?)
DOGE: I am not so comfortable with unelected billionaires playing a major role in governance. BUT Democrats would have a stronger case if Bill Gates hadn't been extremely influential in pandemic preparedness and vaccination policy for 20 years. Btw, these two areas go together!
Soros had too much influence on criminal justice, electing and training AG and DA positions all over the country. Omidyar and Reid Hoffmen were financing on line "misinformation" observatory projects. See Taibbis work on censorship industrial complex. At least Elon is out in the open!
Further comment on DOGE. Cleaning up and auding the governement clearly needed to be done, why wasn't it done before?
"Cleaning up and auding the governement clearly needed to be done, why wasn't it done before?"
I assume this is a rhetorical question?
I guess it is.... But it shouldn't be, right?
Great points about Gates, Soros, etc. !
It is hard to come up with up with any Democrat leadership name that doesn’t turn my stomach. Raskin is one of the worse. What this means to me is that the Dems need to find a voice that hasn’t tainted themself with the Dem’s irrational and childish behavior since Trump 1. As an independent, it seems to be ridiculous to care what polls say today. I believe what Trump said was, drill baby drill was the answer to inflation. Trump realistically has two years. His first 30 days bode well. Sometimes the only way to rebuild a corrupt system is after you totally dismantle it. It would be a waste of time to try and pick and choose employees from USAID to keep. Partial it out and find less ideological employees who don’t think they alone have the power to represent our country to others. Musk is a bull in a China shop. However, if an employee works from an office, they don’t need to justify job performance. The boss sees it every day. When they come back from the field, verbal briefings or written reports, usually both, are given to the higher ups. Why do those who work at home think the standards apply to them?
just a thought about a name that doesn't turn our stomachs. Tammy Duckworth. A role model for our daughters.
Nope. She's on X every day parroting the same crap as Raskin.
Thanks. Can you show me some examples? We aren't on social media.
She was yelling at Hegseth for being unqualified. Some of the people opposing him on this basis seem to want Robert McNamara back. He certainly had experience running a large organization. I don't remember him fondly at Ford, the DoD or the World Bank.
You mean the alcoholic? This is the best Republicans and America can do for its highest military position? She had every right to yell at him for being unqualified.
There are a variety of reasons one could dislike him but what she was yelling about was his lack of experience running a large organization. Like McNamara.
I haven’t much of her so I don’t know. But will keep an eye open. Thanks.
For Democrats to become popular again, they would have to adopt most of Trump's platform, eject the radical woke cohort, and be more clear-spoken caring effeminate (vs raging academic effeminate) in their word delivery. Good luck with that as any candidate meeting these qualification will be ripped to shreds by the academic-spoken raging effeminates controlling the party apparatus.
Question about the inflation comment re gas prices - they are down here in Virginia, not up. Is it different elsewhere? Average pump price is 2.99 in VA per radio news this am, and the gas station I passed this morning was at 2.89. Unless my memory is incorrect, it was over 3.00 last month.
Eggs are going to be expensive until bird flu wanes. There is a vaccine for chickens, but it’s not sterilizing and there has been concern that it can result in undetected carrier birds. There is also a shortage of chicks from hatcheries.
Article on bird flu vaccination for poultry and livestock. https://www.cnn.com/2025/02/25/health/bird-flu-chicken-vaccines/index.html
See also https://news.zoetis.com/press-releases/press-release-details/2025/Zoetis-Receives-Conditional-License-from-USDA-for-Avian-Influenza-Vaccine-H5N2-Subtype-Killed-Virus/default.aspx
Last I checked it wasn’t yet available for home flocks.
Nevada has suspended its cage free law. Chickens in cages have less exposure to wild birds which are the big reservoir of birds flu.
Having a good vision is having an inspiring vision. Nothing in this article suggests anything close to an inspirational idea. And as a rural voter the biggest thing that I look for that may impact inflation is the price of gas and it is dropping very low. When I look up what could be a cause one thing cited is the chance of peace in the Ukraine. If this holds Trump is going to get a lot of credit
I think an under-the-radar opportunity will be capitalizing on the damage the tariffs are going to do to the auto-industry.
Autoworkers are not going to be happy that Trump is scrambling their supply chains--which are heavily integrated with Canada and Mexico's auto industries--just as they were finishing repairing the damage COVID did to them. Making a lively, theatrical defense of those workers' livelihoods part of the Democratic platform, as Trump undermines them in favor of handing out more tax cuts for capital, will help in putting Democrats back in working class people's favor.
Also, a big asset for the Democrats right now is the overconfidence of the GOP and MAGA. It reeks of Democratic overconfidence circa 2012-2016--and overconfident political parties make mistakes. Oftentimes big ones.
James Carville has it right. Do not respond to every Trump provocation. Wait until the honeymoon ends which may be soon and probably no later than memorial day. The Republicans have so far been unified in their "duck and cover" routine but that will end as they need to pass a budget and extend the debt ceiling.
I retired after teaching at the college level for 30 years. BRAG ALERT: I got the top course ratings in my department year after year.
This is what I did. I showed videos. Now, I didn't just pop a video in and watch it for the entire class period. Instead, I would lecture over concepts for the first 30-40 minutes, and then show a video that illustrated my points with real-life examples.
Democrats should do this. Don't go on and on about threats to Democracy, DOGE being bad.
Do an ad of Trump attacking inflation, then show photos of gas prices last November and now. Do an ad on a real person, a real Trump voter, who is being hurt by DOGE.
DON'T LECTURE OVER CONCEPTS. Show people the reality.
p.s. I also got top course ratings because I was tough. I took attendance. I gave a quiz over the chapters BEFORE I lectured over them to stop cramming for exams.
But making the ideas real was the main thing. Students would sit up and watch them, and then I could make the points using a real live person.
MAKE IT ALIVE. MAKE IT ABOUT PEOPLE, NOT CONCEPTS DEMOCRATS.
Gas prices are down, at least here in Virginia. State average is 2.99 per news this morning, and the rural station I drove by was at 2.89.
https://www.eia.gov/petroleum/weekly/gasoline.php
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/gas-prices-national-average-august-oil/
We'll have to wait to really see.
So East Coast and Gulf Coast are down from last week, and East Coast, Midwest, and Gulf Coast are down from a year ago. Lots of swing states there. Probably need to wait until their prices go up to hit on price.
Actually, my point was about using real matters instead of hypothetical ones to connect with people. Gas prices were an example, but if they aren't, no big deal. Just deal with real ones.