"It's The Economy Stupid"...Or Is It?

The only, and I mean only rationale for voting for Donald Trump that I have heard that seems even remotely reasonable is that the economy was "good", i.e. no or low inflation, and that for a large percentage of Biden's term the economy has been "bad", i.e. inflation has been high. And it's true, for most of Trump's term inflation was low, unemployment was low and the jobs were being created in the aggregate. But is this the whole picture? Nope. I addressed this briefly in an earlier blog post "Inflation". The rationale only seems reasonable. What drives most Trump voters isn't an emotion-free analysis of the economic state of affairs and a reasoned conclusion that the Trump's re-election will usher in an era of prosperity. No, it's an excuse to cover for the real reasons for supporting Trump.

There isn't now and there never has been a reason to vote for Trump that isn't rooted in his message of hatred. 

Whatever else he decides to ramble on about, at the center of Trump's public pronouncements is a continual stoking of hatred and fear of (the wrong kind of) immigrants. Listen to his interviews - no matter what question he's asked is turned into a diatribe about immigrants. Even people here legally are demonized as "poisoning the blood" of the nation. Of course he's got other targets for his hatred: "the media" is the 'enemy of the people", undermining a free press, to mention one. That's it, that's all he's got and any fantasy that he will make us strong, or prosperous, or respected internationally is a delusion to justify support for a hateful bigot. 

Trump's administration was a combination of autocratic tendencies with utter ignorance and incompetence. There is no reason to think anything would change in a second Trump presidency other than the ratio of autocracy to incompetence could increase. In the four years he's been out of official power he hasn't gotten any smarter, he hasn't gotten an less self-serving or narcissistic, he hasn't become more familiar with how things work. He's less likely to appoint subordinates who will attempt to guide him toward doing the right thing, or refuse to implement illegal orders, and will be appointing more sycophantic loyalists into high government positions. Whether the loyalists he would hypothetically install are any less ignorant or incompetent as he is is an open question.  Despite his public disavowal of Project 2025, his own stated policies align pretty well with theirs. His Vice Presidential running mate isn't ignorant and incompetent, even if he is often tone-deaf and wrote the introduction to Project 2025. If any of the brains behind 2025 get appointed to government positions, you'll see it implemented, despite what Trump says now. 

There's your options with Trump: some combination of stupidity and fascism; certainly not prosperity.

Democracies, Republics and Elections, Oh My

I have heard the supposed difference between democracies and republics "explained" to me numerous times over the years, and by "explained" I mean "shouted at me", usually with an admonition to "educate myself". For these people a Democracy is nothing more or less than a Direct Democracy, i.e. "Mob Rule", while a  Republic is a government by elected representatives who are guided by a constitution. This is partially true.

"Republic" comes from the Latin Res Publica, "a matter of the people", whereby the government is a public matter and not the private property of a monarch. In other words, in the strictest interpretation, a republic is simply "not a monarchy". The form that a republic can take is quite varied. In the United States, most people who refer to republics are talking about a representative-constitutional government, whereby the executive and legislators are elected by the people for fixed terms and are guided by laws, in our case, a constitution. However who "the people" are can be circumscribed quite broadly. In the early days of the United States only adult, white, male, landowners were permitted to vote. This eventually gave the way to voting rights for all adults, except some felons. In a Socialist, or Communist, Republic, the will of "the people" is assumed to reside in the ruling party, which has elections, but decides ahead of time who may run. In an Islamic Republic, the Quran and the clergy empowered to interpret it decide what's good for the people. Ancient Greek republics limited voting to a citizen class. But even if we accept that the correct or true form of a republic is an elected representative government bound by a constitution, that does not makes democracies and republics mutually exclusive.

"Democracy" comes from demokratia, Greek for "power by the people". "Democracy" therefore literally means power or rule of the people. The simplest form of this is Direct Democracy, often referred to as "Mob Rule", where every decision is voted upon by everyone. Obviously this could only work in very limited situations, such as (very) small towns, or people in small isolated groupings. Direct Democracy almost never exists. A less "pure" form of democracy would involve an elected administrator and/or hired technical people who would keep things running, while important decisions would be voted on. The other end of the democracy continuum would be a system indistinguishable from what we defined above as a representative, constitutional, republic: you elect representatives for fixed terms, who are then responsible to run the government according to a constitution. Those who are careful about their words refer to this as a democratic republic, or just a democracy for short. Nobody who calls the United States a democracy really believes that it is a direct democracy or thinks that a direct democracy is a good thing for a large nation.

Nothing about being a republic guarantees that a tyranny of the majority, the mob rule that detractors of the term democracy so fear, cannot take root. Majorities can still elect representatives that will abuse minorities, and the representatives can be cowed by fear of not being re-elected. What gives the minority rights and protections are the rights and protections that we wrote into our laws early on, such as the Bill of Rights and separation of powers.  

Nothing about a democratic republic, whether you emphasize "democracy" or "republic", guarantees that a system like the Electoral College has to exist. Various representative democracies/democratic republics use different methods for choosing their head of government, or head of state. Most directly elect their president or prime  minister through popular vote. In some countries, notably in the United Kingdom, the Prime Minister is the leader of the party which wins a majority of seats in the House of Commons. We have the system that we do, not because we're a republic, or even strictly because we have a federal system, but because of various compromises arising from competing priorities among the various states. Predominant issues included slavery, small state versus larger states and the tendency for the states to view themselves as sovereign. 

There are several undemocratic features that were built into our framework of government. One has been eliminated: the indirect election of Senators. While today Senators are elected directly by the voters in each state, originally they were selected by each state government. Since gerrymandering was just as prevalent back then as it is now, a non-representative state legislature could appoint someone who represented their interests, which might not align with the interests of the voters. The founders did not trust "the people" to reliably choose their own Senators. Even today the Senate is an undemocratic institution. Small population states, like Wyoming, Vermont and the Dakotas have the same representation as large states like New York, Florida, California and Texas. This made sense in the early days of the nation when states (or at least their leaders) still viewed themselves as sovereign entities and jealously guarded their respective rights and perquisites, but is the culture really noticeably different when you cross a state border these days? The election of a president had several undemocratic features. The electoral college itself, where votes were weighted in favor of smaller states was originally even more undemocratic by the insertion of a second layer of voting between the people and the president - the electors. Unlike today, where the electors for the most part are required to vote in accordance with the voters in their state or district, originally electors were conceived as a way to overturn the vote of the majority of voters in a state if the voters voted for the "wrong" candidate. 

Today's Republican Party, and not just the predominant Trumpist faction, is fixating on these undemocratic aspects of our system and amplifying them in order to retain power. It's not just the lie of the stolen election either. Attempts are being made all across the country, not only in Congress but in state and local election boards, to find ways to "legally" reverse or overturn election results. Roadblocks and speed bumps continue to be put in place to make it more difficult to register or to actually vote. Polling places are moved or eliminated, early or absentee voting is curtailed and unnecessary steps are added to mail-in ballots (how many times do we need to sign or initial the ballots and envelopes?) Voter rolls are purged weeks before an election, referenda to allow felons who have served their time eligible to vote  have been neutered by byzantine rules, gubernatorial powers are curtailed by Republican state legislatures just before a Democratic governor is sworn in, legislatures slow walk or refuse to implement or fund petition initiatives...the list goes on and on. 

Today's Republican Party, as the cliche goes, talks out of both sides of their collective mouth. They claim that their candidate, Donald Trump has the support of the majority of the country, yet they do all that they can to make the will of the majority irrelevant. 

Let the States Decide?

The phrase "let the states decide" is usually used in conjunction with abortion rights and restrictions. But it can be, and is, applicable to many other situations. 

There has always been a tension in the United States between the ideal of local control and the reality that we are all citizens of one nation. Rural people often complain about the hypothetical big city voters who is "telling them what to do". Residents in small states point out how "they're not California". I'll agree that some things should be left up to local citizens. Some things. 

I'll concede that there's often regulations that come out of the federal, or even state, government that do not adequately take into account the facts on the ground. Environmental regulations, safety regulations, you name it. Regulators and elected officials default to a one-size-fits-all approach to law-making. They seldom think through the consequences or downstream effects of their decisions. An example in my own experience as a state government employee involves remote work. In 2020 in response to the Covid pandemic, most state employees were allowed to work from home. When the danger was largely past, our agency head decided to extend the ability of many employees to work from home, leaving the ultimate decision to his managers who knew the situation best. Then we got a new governor whose personal experience informed him that in-person work was more effective an efficient that remote work. Remote work ended, despite evidence that most employees were more productive working from home at least part of the time. One-size-fits-all. In this example the governor should have allowed the work arrangement to be molded to the needs and productivity of the work groups and the individuals involved rather than having one rule across the board. Many government regulations are like this - a standard that doesn't fit that multitude of situations across the country. 

This should absolutely not apply to rights. 

The right of a woman to control her own body should not depend on what side of a state border she lives on. Rights that are enshrined in the Constitution do not change when you move from one state to another, why do we think that other rights do? Let's not forget that for fifty years a woman's right to control her own body was considered a Constitutional right! Not only should rights not depend on where you live, they shouldn't subject to being taken away when a partisan, religiously motivated majority takes control of the Supreme Court. 

And what is meant by "let the states decide"?

Usually it means "let the legislature decide". There's multiple problems with this. Most obvious is the issue of gerrymandering. There are a number of states where statewide elections are often won by Democrats, but the legislature is composed of a majority of Republicans, sometimes with a veto-proof majority. So you have situations where the majority of voters choose Democrats (who usually support abortion rights) but Republicans (who usually support abortions restrictions or bans) are elected. In addition to this, most people are not one-issue voters. Republicans who are elected for a variety of reasons that have nothing to do with abortion will, once elected, push for abortion restrictions even though the majority of the electorate, including some of their own supporters, favor abortion access. My own state of Nebraska is a good example. Polling consistently shows that 50% or more of Nebraskans favor access to abortion, but since Nebraskans have elected a majority of legislators who support abortion restrictions, that's what gets passed in the legislature. Many of those 50% however live in districts where they are the minority. 

In any state so far that put abortion rights on the ballot, the measure has passed, even in "red" states where the legislature and executive had attempted to impose restrictions. There are several states with referenda on the ballot next month, including Nebraska (although in Nebraska there are two - one for and one against - pay attention to what you're voting for!). In Nebraska there have been attempts to remove the issue from the ballot, and hopefully the pro-Choice measure will prevail, but fundamental rights should never be subject to a vote.

Inflation

There are things that a president or Congress can affect, and there are things they can't. One thing that a president's policies can't substantially influence is inflation. 

During Trump's term, inflation was low; though most of Biden's term, inflation has been high. This has caused some voters to conclude that for purely economic reasons, Trump is a better choice for president. The question to ask, one which most people looking for a non-racist rationale for voting for Trump don't ask is "What specific actions did Trump take to keep inflation low and what specific actions did Biden take that resulted in high inflation?" The answer? None and none.

Most economic metrics have been on a positive trend since Obama's first term as we recovered from the recession caused by the housing crash, continuing through the first three years of Trump's term. Then came Covid. The economy virtually shut down for most of 2020. Due to the resulting lack of travel, gas prices dropped precipitously. These unusually low prices would make the return to more normal prices in 2021 and 2022 seem worse than it was. Other factors contributed to high inflation. The fast recovery in 2021 left many businesses scrambling to ramp up production, increase staffing and restart the stalled supply chain. The Econ 101 principle of supply and demand will cause prices to go up in this scenario. There's a theory that the stimulus checks issued in both the Trump and Biden administrations "overheated" the economy, contributing to increased demand with not enough supply. Wages have been going up in most industries, which is another factor. Let's not forget the probability that corporations are taking advantage of the situation to unnecessarily raise prices. Rents have skyrocketed - but this is a function of local property taxes and has nothing to do with anything on the national level. Gas prices, after a peak in 2022 have slowly receded to pre-2020 levels. 

Both Trump and Harris have talked about reducing inflation, even though there's not really anything they can do about it. Harris floated an idea about targeting price gouging. Trump has suggested ending income tax on overtime; both have talked about ending taxes on tips. Trump has made vague promises about rolling back prices. Inflation has slunk back to a more normal level, so whoever gets elected in November can claim to be presiding over low inflation. What both Harris and Trump hope we don't realize is that once prices go up, they're not going back down, at least not macroeconomically. 

If you're looking for reasons to vote for either candidate, the inflation rates of the last few years shouldn't be among them.

Confession: I Have Voted for Republicans

Until fairly recently I would vote for the person, rather than the party. I have voted for Democrats, Republicans, Independents, and Libertarians. After seeing how, with the election of Barack Obama, the Republican Party had turned into a party that prided itself on racism and ignorance, I vowed I'd never again vote for a member of that party. (In reality the change to the Republican Party had been underway at least since the 90's, as Newt Gingrich turned his party into nothing more than an anti-Clinton caucus)

Republican platforms used to emphasize fiscal responsibility, limited government, a strong military (with strong international alliances), and free trade. While taken to extremes, all of these positions could be harmful. Government is not a business where profit is the prime motivator. Government cannot be so limited that we're run by oligarchs. Regulations are necessary to protect those who are not part of the 1%. Free trade cannot be an excuse to abuse workers or eviscerate unions. But they are also, in theory, good policies when balanced by social programs, investment in infrastructure, reasonable regulation and worker's rights. Republicans of the past, while tending to be conservative, were also willing to work with Democrats and come to compromises, balanced approaches to governance. Republicans and Democrats at the state and local level were often indistinguishable from each other. A mayor or a governor was focused more on strictly local concerns and not their fealty to a president or other national figure. 

I still think some conservative principles make for good government. Fiscal concerns need to balance our desire to solve society's problems - you can't just throw money at everything thinking money will solve everything. I believe a strong military is essential, although I also believe we should be more circumspect about when we get involved in other countries' problems. In general I support free trade without a lot of barriers like tariffs, which often accomplish nothing other than raising prices for consumers - protectionist policies should be reserved for circumstances where foreign businesses are truly attacking ours. 

But there's really not a choice any longer. Any possible pros of Republican governance are swamped by the cons of not only their cultish devotion to Losin' Don, but the party's transformation into a vehicle for mindlessly attacking anything progressive or liberal. The flip side of that is that any liberal Democratic positions that I am uncomfortable with are immaterial compared to the horrors of incipient fascism that the Republicans represent. 

Opinions vs. Facts

There are some things that are objectively true no matter whether you agree with them or not, and there are things that are subjective, a matter of opinion. That ubiquity of social media has convinced many of us that all information is of equal value and truth is determined by what our opinion about the information is. 

Like it or not, what constitutes a fact in some realms is determined by experts. There are many areas in which I am incompetent to render an opinion - medicine, and it's subcategories of epidemiology and virology among them. I am happy to defer to my primary care physician for most medical situations, and to the CDC and other boards of experts in matters of pandemics. Can the experts, in medical science or any other field, be wrong? Of course. Science, in every category, advances and learns as time goes on, unfortunately, sometimes from its mistakes. But the response to the possibility that an expert might be wrong is not to reflexively and mindlessly disregard anything an expert tells you simply because they are an expert. Just because the answer might seem counter-intuitive to a non-expert, or involve discomfort or inconvenience doesn't mean that it's wrong. Surfing the internet looking for some crackpot to validate your ill-informed opinion is unlikely to yield any real answers either. 

The thing about deferring to professionals, whether they are scientists with advanced degrees and a track record of results, or seasoned reporters working for established news agencies, or economists who understand the interplay of the myriad variables that make up our economy, is that we know who they are. We can check their reputations without necessarily understanding fully their field of expertise. Professionals will check their sources, make sure that their results can be duplicated, verify their math and underlying assumptions, before making an unequivocal statement. The non-professionals, be they bloggers, or podcasters, or some Bubba with a Twitter/X account can say anything. If they have a large enough following then the unsourced rumor that they just started is going to sprint around the globe multiple times before the truth can get its shoes laced up. I put politicians firmly in the camp of non-professional, by the way. 

The "stealing and eating cats and dogs" in Springfield Ohio rumor is a textbook example. One person posted about it on Facebook, only to later recant and take her post down. There was one police call (months ago) about a missing cat (which soon after turned up). The Facebook post was shared, it was picked up on X, people who themselves did not having a missing pet showed up at a City Council meeting to complain about immigrants stealing and eating pets. A candidate for the presidency repeated the rumor during the debate and was quickly fact-checked and corrected, which caused all the believers in this rumor to double down. Photos were shared, not of immigrants in Springfield stealing and eating pets, but of a mentally ill American woman in another Ohio city killing a cat and possibly eating it; a photo, also in another city, of man carrying a goose, which as it later turned out, he was picking up off the road after it had been run down. No actual evidence that immigrants are stealing and killing pets has surfaced, yet the believers are not dissuaded one bit. On social media platforms you'll often hear the phrase "the mainstream media isn't reporting this" - usually the reason is that it isn't happening. Long established reputable news organizations aren't know for publishing unverified rumors and the CDC isn't going to recommend that you inject disinfectant. 

Does this mean that everything that you see on social media is wrong? Of course not. But finding the truth in a given situation takes more than scrolling through Musk's online junkyard and searching for something that "makes sense" to you and fits with your preconceived view of the world. In my observation most of what I see posted on X is nothing but opinion. Occasionally there's a well researched and thought-through analysis (some that make me reconsider my opinion on the matter) but usually it's just someone screaming into the ether. 

A tactic that I see fairly often is a tweet with a photo or video clip attached where the tweet describes the attached image at odds with the image itself.  A recent example showed First Lady Jill Biden at a cabinet meeting. One tweet claimed that she was "sitting in" for President Biden others claimed she was running the cabinet meeting and pointed out that she was sitting at the head of the table. This of course spurred a lot of outrage for MAGA world, where they all assumed that Dr. Biden was pulling an Edith Wilson. But a glance at the photo would reveal that President Biden was there and was sitting in the seat where presidents traditionally sat (center of the long side of the table, on the right in this photo, in front of the flags) and Dr. Biden was a guest addressing the cabinet. 

Mainstream media has its own biases, the experts sometimes get it wrong, but looking to X for truth is idiotic. 

The Trump-Harris Debate

I'm usually of the opinion that debates are useless, that the participants don't really answer the questions and the moderators don't hold the candidates' feet to the fire, asking follow up questions. I certainly don't believe you can clearly declare winners and losers. After Tuesday's debate, I'm changing my mind, at least about this one. 

The debate between former President Trump and President Biden, was short on substance as usual. Biden presented his ideas and policies and mostly answered the questions, but he did so in such a halting manner, appearing confused and befuddled, and once even trailed off into unintelligible mumbles. All Trump had to do was stand up straight and speak in a confident tone and he appeared to be the stronger candidate. It brought focus to a situation which many Democrats had long feared: that Biden was not mentally and physically able to effectively campaign. (Whether he can still effectively lead for the remainder of his term is an open question). So the Democrats closed ranks and united behind Vice President Harris.

From the time it was clear that she would be the replacement nominee to the day of the debate Harris was written off as a weak candidate. That she had no accomplishments, that she was a "DEI Hire", that she was unintelligent, that she was incoherent when she spoke and had no plans. All of that was put to rest on Tuesday night.

I'm going to concede that she could have more clearly answered some of the questions. But I'll give any politician a pass if answering a question about a mistake is a no-win scenario. In a perfect world I'd like to see our elected office holders come clean when they erred, but what happens in reality is that the mea culpa becomes an out-of-context clip or meme that is used to attack them. For example, former Speaker of the House Pelosi has recently said that she takes responsibility for the events of January 6th, not because she actually did anything wrong, or incited the rioters, but because she was taking a "the buck stops here" position due to her position as Speaker. Right wing trolls have used this brief quote to claim that Pelosi was the instigator of the attempted overturning of an election. Harris addressed some of the questions aimed at her weaknesses and did as well as anyone - what she didn't do was attack the moderators for asking, calling them "nasty" and losing her temper. About the only time she got even a little bit rattled was when she talked about her change of position on fracking. 

MAGA world is accusing her of lying throughout, but most of what they are calling lies, might be misleading or out of context.

• The Trump National Sales Tax: Trump isn't proposing a national sales tax per se, but Harris is saying that his huge tariffs increases as effectively a tax increase since they will be levied on sales
• Trump supports Project 2025: Trump has specifically disavowed the plan, but many of his own proposals are mirrored in Project 2025, and in general they are not that different
• Trump calls for a bloodbath if he loses:  Trump used the term "bloodbath" to describe the state of the auto industry if he lost in November
• Trump will sign a national abortion ban: Trump says he won't, his VP pick, Vance, says he will. Trump has been all over the map on abortion, but he did very specifically nominate 3 avowedly anti-abortion justices to the Supreme Court

Many of the other things that the Trumpists are calling lies, were, in fact, true. One example is the post Charlottesville quote "there were very fine people on both sides". He said it, Harris quoted it accurately. Snopes recently posted an article debunking a misquoting of his statement - he did not literally say "Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists are very fine people". Snopes was clear in their article that most of the people on one side were Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists and that he did say "there were very fine people on both sides". 

Trump has bragged that he doesn't need to prepare for debates, whether this is true or not is up for debate (ha ha), but it's very obvious that Harris did prepare. The questions were ones that you would expect and she thought through ahead of time how she would respond. She didn't need to be given the questions prior to the debate. Trump is bragging that he won and also that the debate was rigged against him. Harris is accused of wearing CIA quality in-ear receivers so that she could be fed answers. Repeating information heard through an earpiece in real time would not have resulted in the smooth, no hesitation, delivery of Harris' responses. 

Trump did himself no favors. His responses were, from the start, defensive and rambling. His claims of baby executions and cat eating by immigrants (still no videos of that, despite every American having a cell phone camera with them 24/7 - if there is, I will gladly admit Trump was right) was only the tip of the iceberg. What really decided the winner of the debate in my opinion was how Harris was able to take control and goad Trump into losing control and lashing out angrily over inconsequential things like the size of rally crowds and whether people left early. She kept her cool and determined the way things proceeded. 

Harris did say she was willing to debate again, but Trump has come out and said that he will not agree to any other debates...because he won. His rationale was that a loser in a prizefight will always ask for a rematch...even though after he debated Biden, Trump immediately asked to meet for another debate! make up your mind Donnie!

I doubt many minds were changed. The Trump cult is still 100% for Trump. The Harris camp isn't going to defect to Trump. Maybe a few people along the undecided fringes (who are these people?) will realize that Harris is a strong candidate and will be a strong president. I believe that some lukewarm anti-Trump voters will decide that sitting it out isn't in the cards any longer.

Meanwhile Losin' Don and his minions continue on, evil minds plotting destruction, sorcerers of death's construction, poisoning brainwashed minds. 

Social Media Censorship

A clip from a speech that Vice President Harris made in 2019 when she was a Senator running for president is making the rounds on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. Typically the tweet starts with something along the lines of: "Kamala: I will censor content on X that I don't like", followed by a clip where she doesn't say anything like that. In the clip she is actually saying:

"We'll put the Department of Justice of the United States back in the business of justice. We will double the Civil Rights Division and direct law enforcement to counter this extremism. We will hold social media platforms accountable for the hate infiltrating their platforms because they have a responsibility to help fight against this threat to our democracy. And if you profit off of hate, if you act as a megaphone for misinformation or cyber warfare, if you don't police your platforms, we are going to hold you accountable as a community.”

I have not been able to find a text of the full speech, so I don't for sure what the context is for these remarks. It's also unclear what she intends by "hold them accountable". What is clear is that does not mention censoring social media platforms or shutting them down. I can draw some conclusions based on who she is speaking to and what was going on nationally. 

She is addressing the NAACP, a Black advocacy organization, and there had been a number of killings inspired by racial animus that had been abetted by social media posts. She specifically invokes the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department. One can infer from her remarks that she is targeting online incitement to violence. I have seen arguments that what she is saying amounts to de facto censorship, if not censorship de jure. Free speech is not absolute. There are laws making certain narrow categories of speech illegal. Two examples are libel (although libel is more of a civil matter) and the previously mentioned incitement to violence. Individuals can be held to account in a court of law, but social media platforms cannot be. Why is that?

Section 230 of the 1934 Communications Act as amended in 1996 states that “No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider." In other words, a social media platform is not responsible to moderate their content (except for child pornography and bootleg movies) and cannot be held responsible for what gets posted there, like a publisher of a newspaper or the producer of a television or cable program would. Both former President Trump and President Biden are in favor of repealing Section 230. Trump was for this mainly (in my opinion) because Twitter (when it was still Twitter) was fact checking his tweets and was allegedly suppressing conservative and Trump-supporting content. I'm not sure what Biden's motivation is. (Side note: it's funny how the Trumpists were up in arms about how Twitter was "censoring" right wing speech, even though it was a private company that had every right to do so and now they're celebrating Musk who is doing similar things to left wing speech [which he categorizes as "propaganda"] because as a private owner he has every right to do so). In the larger context Harris isn't suggesting anything that the last two presidents have already suggested (she's not really suggesting anything, since the clips that are circulating are from five years ago). What she said in that speech, right or wrong, unconstitutional or not, is mainstream, but as usual her opponents ignore this and brand her words as that of a communist. 

For all the hand wringing and pearl clutching by Harris' opponents, do they ever consider the anti-free speech actions of their avatar, Losin' Don?

• In 2020, after Twitter began appending fact checks to his tweets Trump issued an executive order tat effectively re-interprets Section 230 and involves the government in platforms' moderation policies. In other words, Trump did what his supporters allege that Harris' 5-year old words indicate she will do - if their interpretation is correct
• In 2017 Trump publicly mused about changing the libel laws to make it easier for the government to sue media organization. In effect, to give the government a cudgel to prevent criticism of the president
• In 2020 Trump sued Facebook and Twitter for not publishing some of his posts and tweets
• In 2017 Trump halted whistleblower protections
• Trump aides call the press the opposition party
• Trump repeatedly call the mainstream press the enemy of the people
• Trump campaign calls for holding the media accountable (wording sound familiar?) for trying to rig the election

There's more, some more overt than others, but Trump's antipathy toward a free press should not be a surprise to anyone. 

If Harris' 5-year old speech is indicative of her current policy position and it means censorship, of course I'm concerned, (1) I don't believe that's the most logical, reasonable inference to be made and (2) Her election opponent has already engaged in more direct anti-free speech actions.

Policy vs. Personality

In every election, whether for President of the United States or for mayor of a small town, there's a the age-old question about what's more important, policy or personality. "Policy" should be the more obvious answer, but the reality is that most people consider personality, at least partially, as an important metric upon which to base a decision. 

In most elections candidates make a lot of promises. Sometimes they follow through, other times they don't. Sometimes they simply can't. Many times shit happens. Did George W Bush plan on presiding over a global war on terror when he was running? Did Barack Obama think he was going to walk into a recession when he threw his hat in the ring? Did Donald Trump anticipate a worldwide pandemic? Whatever they thought they'd be doing, events conspired against them. Even in the best of times Presidents are not dictators, they have to contend with two other co-equal branches of government, which may or may not be sympathetic. At best, campaign promises should be taken with a grain of salt and viewed only as a rough guide to how he or she will govern. After all, the point of campaigning is to convince more people to vote for you than for the other candidate, and getting down in the weeds of detailed policy proposals is going to lose most voters, and bore many of them. 

Often opposition to Trump is caricatured as "orange man bad", or TDS - Trump Derangement Syndrome, or "mean tweets". And I'm sure that there are people who oppose him just because he's an asshole, but for most it's deeper than that. While anyone who thinks they are qualified to be president has to possess a healthy ego and self regard, Trump's personality goes well beyond that. He is a narcissist who has demonstrated that whatever he thinks, no matter the evidence against it, is the right way - the only way. During his time in office, and during the campaign this year, he has demonstrated an abysmal ignorance of how things work, how anything works. Sure, a president can't know everything, but they have to have a willingness to learn, to lean on subject matter experts to help them arrive at the best decisions. This ignorance manifested itself in his view of how tariffs work, how NATO is funded and whether injecting disinfectant is a good idea, among many other areas.  He said out loud that he would be a dictator, but just on his first day, as if that made it acceptable. 

Trump's personality is such that he takes everything personally. Those who disagree with him are sick, evil, deranged, un-American, treasonous. Enemies of the people. He has made it clear that he will exact revenge on those who he believes have wronged him. A president has to be the president of all the people. All the people may not agree about how a president does their job, but it has to be clear that the president puts the welfare of all the people first. Trump pits us against each other. There's us and them. And his "us" are who he views as the "real Americans" and the rest of us...

So, while the policies that I'm aware of are enough to disqualify him from receiving my vote, who he is should disqualify him from receiving anyone's vote.

Arlington

Soldiers die in war. Soldiers die when there isn't a war. Soldiers die when there is bad planning by civilian leadership. Soldiers die when there is bad execution by military leadership. Soldiers die even in the midst of what seemed like a good plan. 

Should the withdrawal of our military from Afghanistan gone smoother, more orderly? In retrospect - of course. The withdrawal in its last stages was chaotic with Afghans clinging to departing aircraft and mobbing the airfield. A terrorist attack killed thirteen service members. When things like this happen, someone has to get the blame. And who is the most appropriate target for that blame? The President is the Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Armed Forces and the metaphorical buck stops with him. And he certainly was blamed. 

To listen to the pro-Trump/anti-Biden voices, you would think that the thirteen deaths were the only ones to have occurred. It's true that they were the only military deaths in Afghanistan in 2021, but there were also 15 military deaths in 2017 (12 killed-in-action KIA); 16 (13 KIA) in 2018; 23 (17 KIA) in 2019 and 11 (4 KIA) in 2020. Where was the outrage and recriminations toward Trump during that time? There wasn't any. People outside MAGA world understood that deaths happen. When military deaths happened when Biden was president, it became political. 

I'm not going to pretend to understand the grief of the families who lost their loved ones during that terrorist attack. They have every right to express their anger and point the finger at who they believe is to blame for the death of a family member. But the Trump campaign has politicized the grief of these families in order to score points. 

Let's jump to the Arlington visit.

Last week media, including social media, reported that Former President Trump participated in a wreath laying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery to honor the thirteen service members who were killed in a terrorist attack during the withdrawal from Afghanistan on the third anniversary of their deaths. It was also reported that neither President Biden nor Vice President Harris attended. The reports gave the impression that this was an official commemoration that Trump attended. MAGA-oriented social media accounts quickly jumped on this story, accusing Biden and Harris of "not showing up" for this commemoration. Something seemed off about this story, so I dug a little to get some context. A quick Google search indicated that the only "official" wreath laying ceremonies take place on Memorial Day and Veterans Day with the President laying the wreath (although the president does not always do so). Anyone can apply to do a wreath laying at the Tomb of the Unknowns, and they occur every single day of the year. The application was made by Marlon Bateman, a Trump administration State Department official, on behalf of the family of one of the service members killed in the attack. Initially NPR reported that the memorial was for three of service members, not all thirteen, although I can no longer find that reference, so it may have been incorrect. It was clear, although it was not reported as such, that this was a privately sponsored event that Trump was invited to and that Biden and Harris were not invited to. This context did not surface until NPR reported a few days later that a campaign video was made from images of the event, including images taken in a prohibited area, and that a Trump aide pushed an Arlington staffer, ignoring her instruction to refrain from recording in the prohibited area. 

Once the full story came out Trump was rightly criticized, but being his usual self, doubled down, lying that he had received permission, or that the families had authorized the video in Section 60 (which they had no authority to do). Gaslighting proceeded in full force, with MAGA world spreading the lie that those chiding Trump were attacking Gold Star families.  And amid the denial that he was there for political purposes, his campaign released a campaign video of him strolling among grave stones. What can I even say about the disgusting "thumbs up" photo at the gravesite?

And somehow - somehow people believe that Trump supports the military, even after disrespectful events like this, after he ridiculously states that the Presidential Medal of Freedom is "better" than the Medal of Honor - on top of all the ugly things he has said about the military over the years. "Suckers and Losers"; "I like those who weren't captured"; "I always wanted a Purple Heart"...and on and on. 

And yet...there's still a chance he'll be re-elected.

Debunking

The other day I expressed some frustration about what I called the hair-splitting of fact-checkers. Bleach or disinfectant? What difference does it make? In the grand scheme of things, not much, but accuracy is important, especially when getting one word wrong is going to convince people that your whole argument is wrong. 

Injecting Disinfectant

The whole "he told people to inject bleach" story is a perfect example. In 2020 Trump, along with some of his medical advisors was having regular press conferences to update the nation on aspects of the Covid-19 pandemic. In April of that year he said this:

"So supposing we hit the body with a tremendous — whether it's ultraviolet or just a very powerful light — and I think you said that hasn't been checked because of the testing...And then supposing you brought the light inside the body, which you can do either through the skin or some other way, and I think you said you're going to test that, too."

This was a follow up to remarks by Bill Bryan, head of Homeland Security's Science and Technology Division about the virus not surviving on surfaces that were exposed to light or cleaned with disinfectants, like bleach or isopropyl alcohol. 

Trump continued with this:

"I see the disinfectant that knocks it out in a minute, one minute. And is there a way we can do something like that by injection inside or almost a cleaning? As you see, it gets in the lungs, it does a tremendous number on the lungs, so it would be interesting to check that."

So no, he didn't tell people to inject bleach, but he did suggest that it was a viable option. It's a distinction without a difference. How is musing that injecting disinfectant in front of the whole country any better than telling people to inject bleach? As usual, Trump cannot admit that he was wrong, or misspoke. He could have apologized for the miscommunication, especially in light of the fact that medical health experts, not to mention Lysol, felt the need to clarify that injecting or ingesting disinfectant was a bad idea and could kill you. What he did do was claim that he was being "sarcastic":

“I was asking a question sarcastically to reporters like you just to see what would happen...a very sarcastic question to the reporters in the room about disinfectant on the inside.”

What?! - How is that any better? Or any more believable? We're in the early stages of a pandemic that will end up killing a million Americans and he's being sarcastic? The White House spokesperson claimed that the press had taken him out of context. 

I once actually encountered a couple of men in person who actually believed that he was joking. 

When someone claims, as was done at the Democratic National Convention, that Trump suggested that people inject bleach, the details may be wrong, but not all that different than the specifics.

Suckers and Losers

During a trip to Paris in 2018 Trump passed up an opportunity to visit the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery — which is home to the graves of Americans who fought and died in World War I. He is alleged to have said "Why should I go to that cemetery? It's filled with losers." In a separate conversation on the same trip, Trump allegedly referred to the more than 1,800 marines who lost their lives at Belleau Wood as "suckers" for getting killed. The media who reported this at the time relied on anonymous sources. 

I tend to trust that reporters don't make up quotes by anonymous sources. These are professionals who would not like to get "burned" by publishing inaccurate information. However, the sources themselves might have had an axe to grind - had a personal reason for feeding the press false information. Trump's team denied these allegations and nothing surfaced to either confirm or deny them. One staffer backed up his assertion that Trump did not say that veterans were "suckers and losers" by noting that retired General Kelly was standing with Trump: "I did not hear POTUS call anyone losers when I told him about the weather. Honestly, do you think General Kelly would have stood by and let ANYONE call fallen Marines losers?" As if an aid to the president would publicly remonstrate his boss, whatever his personal feelings.

Which is interesting, because in October 2023 Kelly said this: "What can I add that has not already been said? A person that thinks those who defend their country in uniform, or are shot down or seriously wounded in combat, or spend years being tortured as POWs are all 'suckers' because 'there is nothing in it for them.' A person that did not want to be seen in the presence of military amputees because 'it doesn't look good for me.' A person who demonstrated open contempt for a Gold Star family – for all Gold Star families – on TV during the 2016 campaign, and rants that our most precious heroes who gave their lives in America's defense are 'losers' and wouldn't visit their graves in France."

Trump talks out of both sides of his mouth when it comes to the military and veterans. On one hand he claims to support them, which usually doesn't go beyond saying "I support the military". But I don't have to dig too deep to find Trump's true thoughts about the men and women in the military: he doesn't like people who were captured and the Presidential Medal of Freedom is better than the Medal of honor. "That’s the highest award you can get as a civilian. It’s the equivalent of the Medal of Honor, but civilian version," the former president said during his remarks. "It’s actually much better, because everyone gets the Congressional Medal of Honor — that’s soldiers. They’re either in very bad shape because they’ve been hit so many times by bullets, or they’re dead." Let's not forget his statement at Turning Point USA in 2022 that he wanted to give himself the Congressional Medal of Honor but was talked out of it. 

Even without Kelly's statement, Trump's "suckers and losers" remark is extremely believable

Very Fine People

Recently Snopes came out with a report stating that Trump did not call Neo-Nazi and White Supremacists "very fine people". MAGA world jumped on this as somehow debunking his support for the alt right at the August 2017 "Unite the Right" rally. Interesting in that conservatives generally discount anything from Snopes due to its supposed liberal bias. In fact they disdain any fact checkers who question their version of events. 

What Trump did say was that there were "very fine people on both sides" and he did also say that he wasn't talking about Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists "who should be condemned totally". 

Most people who heard Trump say this, or read about it afterward, concluded that despite his disavowal of the Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists, the people on one of those sides were almost exclusively Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists, therefore he was calling Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists "very fine people". The Snopes article on this subject seems to acknowledge this. 

Editors' Note: Some readers have raised the objection that this fact check appears to assume Trump was correct in stating that there were "very fine people on both sides" of the Charlottesville incident. That is not the case. This fact check aimed to confirm what Trump actually said, not whether what he said was true or false. For the record, virtually every source that covered the Unite the Right debacle concluded that it was conceived of, led by and attended by white supremacists, and that therefore Trump's characterization was wrong. 

Trump seems to conclude, whether ignorantly or purposefully, that there were people there to peacefully protest the pulling down of a Confederate statue that had nothing to do with the Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists - and these were the "very fine people". This stretches the bounds of credulity. This was a rally organized by and for Neo-Nazis, the whole purpose was to bring their views out in public. But we're to believe that "very fine people", who were not at all, not even a little bit, sympathetic or supportive of Neo-Nazi or White Supremacist ideology somehow held their noses and participated. If I march with the Nazis the logical conclusion is that I'm a fellow traveler with the Nazis - not among the "very fine people". You can't say "Josef Stalin was a great guy, but I condemn the mass murders that he conducted" - you can't say you're condemning the Nazis while saying what great guys they are. 

Russia, Russia, Russia

This one would take more time, but it's worth addressing anyway. Mueller's report did nothing to exonerate Trump. In fact it specifically says that it doesn't exonerate Trump. Here's a few links to things I wrote about the Mueller Report:

https://tjpolitics.blogspot.com/2019/04/i-just-finished-reading-redacted.html

https://tjpolitics.blogspot.com/2019/05/yes-there-was-collusion.html

https://tjpolitics.blogspot.com/2020/10/russia-russia-russia-and-lil-bit-o.html

https://tjpolitics.blogspot.com/2022/07/russia-russia-russia.html

Conclusion

It's important to get our facts straight and not get sucked into our own conspiracy theories regarding Trump that are based on what we wish were true but are simply not. It's equally important to recognize that there is a difference between denying and debunking. A denial is someone simply stating that an allegation is false. A debunking is proof that an allegation is false. 

Determining what Trump did or didn't say is not always straightforward. His statements meander and ramble. He contradicts himself. He gaslights us. His supporters want to concentrate on whether we get a word or two wrong when the issue is the context and intent. Is injecting disinfectant actually better than injecting bleach? Is making sarcastic comments to "see what [reporters] will do" better than making ignorant statements? Is calling a crowd comprised mainly of Nazis and their ilk "very fine people" any different than calling Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists "very fine people"? 

It's incumbent upon us to know what we're talking about. Don't double down with an inaccurate quote and insist that you heard him say "bleach". You didn't. If they're going to split hairs, be prepared. 

I Alone Can Fix It

One of the criticisms that I have seen about Vice President Harris' campaign is that she is promising to "fix" things. Her critics ask what it is she's planning on fixing, since her party has been in control of the White House for 12 out of the last 16 years. It's a fair question to ask - is she saying that her own team has made a mess that she, turning her back on that team, now has to "fix"? It's a fair question, but a bit disingenuous, coming from people who have already decided that they'll be supporting her opponent. 

Let's start with the assertion that Harris is pledging to fix things. There may be video of her out there using those words, but I haven't seen it. And it's not Harris who infamously declared "I alone can fix it". Harris and her supporters are also not claiming that the country is in a mess of Trump's doing, even though he left office almost 4 years ago. The Trumpublicans are framing things to make it seem as if that's what she and the Democrats are running on. They are also intentionally ignoring and misrepresenting how the government works. 

Despite the perception that a serving president is an all-powerful figure, our government was very consciously set up with three co-equal branches, each with its own ways of asserting authority and frustrating the well-laid plans of the other branches. The last time the Democrats held the White House and Congress, including a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate (counting 2 Democratic caucusing Independents), was during the first two years of President Obama's first term from 2009 - 2011. This was when the Affordable Care Act was passed. By the midterm elections of 2010 the Democrats lost 64 House seats and handed over the majority to the Republicans; the Senate majority shrunk to 53. By the midterms of Obama's second term the Republicans gained the Senate majority as well. Republicans held the presidency and both houses of Congress for the first two years of Trump's term, but it's been split ever since. Divided government limits what any president can do, despite optimistic campaign promises. 

Let's not underestimate the influence of the federal judiciary, especially the Supreme Court. Appointments to the various levels of federal judgeships is one of the main ways that a president can extend their influence beyond their term. Senator McConnell was a main force behind putting a conservative stamp, not only on the Supreme Court, but on lower court appointments. The precedent breaking refusal to consider a Supreme Court nominee by President Obama during his final year in office and the reversal of the new "rule" during Trump's final year in office effectively changed the balance of the court from 5-4 favoring the liberal justices to 6-3 in favor of the conservatives. The new conservative majority is systematically reversing long standing precedent, ostensibly deferring to an originalist  judicial philosophy, but arguably simply using originalism to mask instituting a right wing agenda. 

So, despite 12-4, D's vs. R's in the last 16 years, there's potentially a lot of Republican damage still to be undone. So, despite Republican misrepresentation of her message, she's not suggesting that President Biden is leaving her a mess to fix, or that the "mess" is the result of Democratic mismanagement, but that the job isn't done. 

Harris' campaign philosophy is also partly focusing on the danger that a second Trump term means, separate from any damage that still remains undone during the last three and a half years. I've written regularly on why a second Trump term would be a disaster for the country, so I won't recount it all now, but Harris is prioritizing reminding the electorate of the cons of a Trump presidency, especially since there seems to be some amnesia about some of what went on during his term. 

As with any politician, there are legitimate areas of Harris' record and her proposed agenda, that are subject to criticism. This isn't one of them.

Candidates' Policies - Part II

Is there one single voter out there who is in the dark about how either Trump or Harris will govern if elected? What off-the-grid corner of the backwoods are these people living in? I suppose there are true conservatives, disgusted with Trump, who might be persuaded to vote for a Democrat or an Independent, or far-left liberals who don't think the Democratic Party is progressive enough, or amnesiacs who remember the low inflation days of the Trump administration but have blocked out the whole of 2020. Theoretically these people exist, but "c'mon man" (as President Biden would exclaim) - what cave are they living in?

Any of us who pay the slightest attention to politics (the governor of Nebraska is excluded from this demographic) knows that despite a president's best (or worst) intentions, there are two other co-equal branches of government. The last time a president had a Congress that (mostly) supported his agenda was 2008, when President Obama had a large Democratic majority in the House and 60 Democrats in the Senate - a filibuster-proof majority. After this election either party could control either house of Congress, with a likely single digit majority in the House and a one seat majority at most in the Senate. Hardly the scenario for tyranny of the majority. 

For the most part we know the broad strokes of how each candidate would govern, whether you like either's policies or personality or not. And since we are a de facto two party system, both of the major parties need to be "big tent" organizations, welcoming a range of views. We know what Trump was like since he was the president for four years, and we know how Harris most likely would govern - she was in the Senate, has a long career of public service, has been in the public eye as Vice President and has not been reticent about her goals as president. We also know that a lot of what any candidate says during a campaign is to get people excited, encourage the base to show up on Election Day and yes, maybe draw in those eleven people who are yet undecided. 

What is the right way for a candidate to get their message across? Well certainly not by succumbing to the "standards" that their opponents have set.  Donald Trump was certainly successful in 2016 by setting his own rules. He ignored all norms and "the way it's done" by insulting his way through the early debates, the primaries and the general election campaign. He refused to release his tax returns as had been customary for 40 years. His campaign rallies were more religious tent meetings than political gatherings. He was unapologetically hateful. He famously was asked after the election whether he regretted his divisive rhetoric, "No, I won didn't I?" was his response. But now, VP Harris is being criticized for not having a platform on her website and for not yet doing a sit down interview. Why does she need to do either of those things? I refer you back to the first paragraph. 

There's is no one who doesn't know, at least in general terms, what Harris stands for. She has been in politics for a long time, she makes speeches, she has done interviews, she's done a few rallies. The Democratic convention is next week - we'll see a platform and we'll hear her speak again. She's a Democrat! The calls for her to do things differently than how she's doing them come from her opponents, not from her supporters, the same people who were apoplectic about the supposedly undemocratic method of her nomination as the Democratic candidate for president - that Democrats understood was the best way to move forward and defeat Trump. 

Listen to what she's saying...she's speaking!

The Candidates' Policies - Part I

Vice President Harris has been criticized lately for (1) not sitting down for a long interview with the press and (2) not listing her agenda or policy platform on her website. She is contrasted with Trump, who has sat down for "interviews" and has something that he calls a "platform" on his website. Set aside for a a moment the ridiculous notion that there is anyone out there who is genuinely ignorant of the contrast in governing styles of the two candidates and consider Trump's "platform". I'm going too look at the more ridiculous claims, or those that are so vague as to be worthless. All of the following are from Trump's campaign website https://www.donaldjtrump.com/platform . My comments are in bold italics.

End inflation, and make America affordable again

Okay - so when Harris puts forth a specific plan, that's Communism, but when Trump suggests it. How specifically does he plan on "ending inflation"? Is he talking about bringing prices back down to pre-2024 levels? What about wages? 

Defend our constitution, our bill of rights, and our fundamental freedoms, including freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and the right to keep and bear arms

What does any of this look like? When he was president the only amendment he thought worth defending was the Second. He is on record as wanting to weaken the freedom of the press. 

Prevent world war three, restore peace in Europe and in the middle east, and build a great iron dome missile defense shield over our entire country -- all made in America

Of course no specifics on any of this. Does he even know what the 'Iron Dome' even is?

End the weaponization of government against the American people

We all know that he believes that his legal troubles are some kind of government persecution. This from the guy who encouraged his followers to "lock her up" and is on record as wanting to go after President Biden and any other enemies as revenge for his own prosecutions. 

Cancel the electric vehicle mandate and cut costly and burdensome regulations

The mandate that doesn't exists? Or is he for electric vehicles now that the owner of Tesla is being nice to him?

Cut federal funding for any school pushing critical race theory, radical gender ideology, and other inappropriate racial, sexual, or political content on our children

More things that aren't happening?

Deport pro-Hamas radicals and make our college campuses safe and patriotic again

He thinks anyone who criticizes Israel is "pro-Hamas". Is he talking about deporting American citizens?

Secure our elections, including same day voting, voter identification, paper ballots, and proof of citizenship

He literally tried to overturn the last presidential election

Unite our country by bringing it to new and record levels of success

In the Trump dictionary "unite" means muzzle dissent

Okay, so he has a list that he is calling a policy platform. Where it's not vague it's either dangerous or an unworkable fantasy. He's also being praised, and contrasted positively with Harris because he's sitting down for interviews and inviting reporters in for press conferences. Let's not get too excited about those either. The one with Elon Musk was a lot of softball questions. His press conferences are invitation only. When he gets tough questions he goes on the attack, or rambles incoherently. 

So I don't know what we're learning from these performances that we didn't already know.

 

Taxing Tips

 Now that both major candidates have come out in favor of making tips tax exempt, I have to ask “why?”. Other than pandering to the powerful hospitality industry unions in Nevada.

Tips are income and are considered taxable – subject to income & payroll taxes. In the past, when tips were primarily given in cash, and IRS regulations were looser (or nonexistent) it was easier to avoid reporting some or all of them as income - but they've always been taxable income. With most payments now being made by card or app, virtually all tips go through the employer with income and payroll tax withheld from paychecks. Even with the dwindling number of cash tips, the IRS has been tightening reporting requirements.

There’s a myth that the IRS requires that employers assume that servers receive a certain percentage of the gross sales in tips and withhold income & payroll taxes on that amount whether or not they actually received that amount of tips. The IRS DOES mandate that employees report ALL tips to their employer and that the employer consider those taxes as income & withhold taxes accordingly. If the total reported tips for a business falls below 8% the employer is also required to allocate the difference between the actual percentage and 8% among all tipped employees. (This might be the origin of the myth) This shows up in a separate box on an employee's W-2. The employee must add this amount to the total gross income unless they can provide records to show that their actual tips were less. (Which is why keeping a tip record is important) 

What I do not think is legal is for an employer to assume that servers receive a certain percentage of the gross sales as tips and withhold income & payroll taxes accordingly. (No taxes are withheld from the allocated amounts) I understand that this happens, illegal or not, but I don’t know what recourse an employee has if it’s happening. Bottom line is that it’s not the responsibility of the employer to confirm that 100% of tips are being reported, their only responsibility is to remit the taxes that they collect based on wages plus reported tips .

I understand that employees who depend on tips are in a different boat than hourly or salaried employees. I’ve always known what my pay was going to be before going to work – a tipped employee never knows. But it’s still INCOME. I’d focus more on making those who derive their income from non-wage sources (dividends and so-called carried interest etc.) pay the same income tax rates as wage earners and remove the cap on social security taxes. And speaking of Social Security, if you artificially depress your income by not reporting tips, the amount of income that is used to calculate your eventually Social Security benefits will necessarily be much lower.

Single Issue Voters

Something I have encountered a lot lately is the right-wing one-issue voter who pretends to not be a one-issue voter. A conversation might go like this:

Other guy: I can't vote for Democratic candidate "A", he thinks we should have open borders
Me: [debunks that position]

Other guy: Yeah, but [presents garbled attack on his military service]

Me: Here's a news article debunking that

Other guy: [Yet another unsubstantiated position]

Me: [Easy debunking]

Other guy: Well, he believes in killing babies!

And there you have it. You can expound upon women's bodily autonomy or the immorality of forcing women to put their lives in danger or the ethics of requiring rape victims to give birth to their rapist's baby all day long, but you're going to make no headway against someone who believes that the moment of conception is the start of a fully human life, i.e. "a baby". Anyone who believes that is not statistically likely to be open to debate about the subject and fully believes that an abortion is "killing a baby". 

But this post isn't really about abortion (I get similar reductive "arguments" that end with equating gender-affirming care with "mutilating children"), it's about derailing every political policy discussion and disregarding it in favor of that one issue. If abortion is the issue that overrides every other issue, if it doesn't matter if the pro-choice candidate is for literally every other issue that you think is important, or if the anti-abortion candidate is against literally every other issue that you think is important, then don't waste my time bringing up the border, or taxes, or inflation and just tell me you can't vote for any candidate who is pro-choice. 

Then we can go about our respective days.

So, You Want To Join a Cult - Never Mind, You Already Have

Part of being in a cult is that you don't realize that you're in a cult. 

"No one wakes up in the morning, and after a shower and that first cup of coffee, decides that they’re going to join a cult. No one approached by someone with an engaging smile and an encyclopedic knowledge of the bible thinks “Cool! A cult! Just what I’ve been looking for!” Yet, every day in America, people join up with groups that are labelled cults."
So, You Want To Join a Cult - Part I- Aes Duir Blog

But it's not just religions that spawn cults. The most insidious cult in America right now is the MAGA  Cult, the cult of the man I call "Losin' Don", Donald J. Trump - former President of the United States. 

It didn't start out as a cult - they never do. I don't think it even started out as a serious run for the presidency. 2015 seems like a lifetime ago, but Trump's announcement that he was running for the Republican Party presidential nomination seemed like a big joke. There was no shortage of respectable, experienced, serious contenders among the crowd of Republican governors and senators. But Trump stood out from that crowd. Not because he had any new and exciting ideas, or had a proven track record of leadership, but because he was brash, loud and Americans love a spectacle. 

American politics is seldom about who is best qualified. In a crowded primary field there is a feedback loop of polls and money. Those with name recognition have an early advantage - in polls conducted before any voting takes place typically no one receives anywhere near a majority, but the ones that lead the pack are viewed as "winners" and receive the lion's share of funding, enabling them to run ads to increase their name recognition. News organizations stop paying attention to those with low poll numbers, reinforcing the name recognition of the leaders. Voters, if they're thinking at all, start considering "electability". They figure that if Candidate "A" is polling so low and isn't attracting much in donations, he or she can't win in the general election, so they slowly (or not so slowly) fade away and have to drop out. Trump benefitted from all of this. As people began to drop out it became a contest between Trump and various "not-Trumps". 

Even after he secured the Republican nomination, I'm not sure if it was a cult yet. There were still plenty of Never Trumpers in the Republican Party who wished he would just go away, but once a nominee is chosen, the parties typically close ranks around their candidate. In the general election the irrational hatred that many people had for Hillary Clinton made the difference. Many voters who would have voted for Senator Sanders or Vice President Biden held their noses and voted for Trump. "How bad could it be?" many Republicans thought, "We'll keep him in line".  

It was once Trump was elected that the vast army of his voters transitioned from an amorphous mob into a cult. It was when he had the power of the presidency that he began to wield his power as a cult leader. 

The Way, the cult that I was a member of, started out as just another rural small town church. From the mid fifties to the mid sixties its leader was just a guy who travelled around teaching his Bible class and holding services at his family's farmstead. It wasn't until the sixties were almost over when he convinced a bunch of hippies that he had "The Truth" that he was able to turn his small potatoes operation into a worldwide movement with him as the virtually infallible head of it all. 

Something that all cult leaders love is persecution. It allows them to present themselves as fighting against the evil system. I used to hear how when we were being attacked it showed how the Devil was worried and was trying to stop us. This soon became the line that Trump and his followers took. According to them, everything that Trump did was godly and patriotic, therefore anyone who opposed him was satanic and un-American. Any reporting that pointed out his corruption, or even his policy mistakes, was fake news. News organizations were "the enemy of the people". Other politicians were "treasonous" or "traitors" and should be "locked up". 

One of the characteristics of cults that is often overlooked is the fear of looking stupid. I don't subscribe to the idea that cult members are brainwashed (at least in most cases), but that they have so much time and energy invested that they can't bring themselves to admit that they may have been wrong. (I wrote some blog posts about this concept Brainwashing, Deprogramming). Trump's followers have made MAGA such a part of their identity that any suggestion that Trump was a bad president, or indeed any criticism at all of him, becomes a personal attack. They support positions that Trump holds that are in direct opposition to their own long-held beliefs and do so without any awareness of the contradiction inherent therein. Two examples illustrate this phenomenon:

At one time mainstream Republicans were the party of moral uprightness (or so they claimed). To them the Democrats were the party of hedonism, licentiousness, and ungodliness. In the nineties they viewed the Clintons as prime examples of this. Much of the conservative opposition to Clinton was ostensibly due to his sexual escapades with an intern in his White House office. They prized religious piety as a characteristic to which politicians should aspire. (We'll ignore for now their dislike for Carter, the most visibly Christian of all recent presidents) Yet with Trump, who has cheated on all his wives, has a history of behaving unethically in his business dealings, and is seemingly ignorant of even the basics of Christianity is viewed as a messiah figure, sent by God to save the nation and its Christian citizens. This isn't hyperbole. Many Christians compare Trump to Cyrus, a Persian monarch who according to the Bible, freed the Jews and allowed them to return to Israel and rebuild their temple. And is called "messiah" in the Bible. This is not something that is believed by a tiny fringe, but is a widespread belief among Trump followers. 

The other example is more recent. Trump followers tend to be Second Amendment absolutists. They made Kyle Rittenhouse, who killed two people and seriously wounded a third during a protest in Kenosha Wisconsin, into a hero. Kyle was all-in with MAGA world and even had a personal meeting with Trump. Trump people loved him and defended him in social media, viewing his actions as perfect examples of self defense, and why gun ownership is a sacred right. Kyle reciprocated with unqualified support of Trump. Trump, however, isn't a Second Amendment absolutist, he changes his positions when it's convenient - if he even has core beliefs other than securing a payday for himself. Last week Rittenhouse posted on X that he thought Trump was weak on the Second Amendment and could no longer support him or vote for him in November. The reaction from the MAGAverse was swift and vicious. The thousands of Trump acolytes, instead of considering that Murderin' Kyle might have a point and having an open debate about Trump's Second Amendment bona fides, decried Rittenhouse's words as lack of loyalty. The previously holy Second Amendment took second place to their holy avatar, Donald Trump. 

One might ascribe the obstinacy of Trump voters to a simple desire to see conservative politics overcome liberalism. And in a general election where Democrats are demonized as socialists, communists and pedophiles, that may be part of it, but what about their fealty to him even against other Republicans? Trump has convinced his faithful that politicians whose conservative credentials are unimpeachable, like Mitt Romney, Mitch McConnell, Ted Cruz and former Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse are Republicans In Name Only (RINOs). Republicans who could have been much more efficient at advancing a conservative agenda have been lumped in with far left lawmakers and as equally worthy of MAGA scorn. They had a chance to nominate someone else this time around. Ron DeSantis, as unlikeable as he is, has proved as governor of Florida that he knows how to implement the MAGA agenda, but he is efficient - he knows how to get things done (as much as I dislike those "things"). Nikki Haley, as much as she toed the right wing line, was actually a fairly moderate governor. Nonetheless, Trump got at least 50% of the vote in all but one primary. 

Not everybody who votes for Trump is in his cult. Some people just hold their noses and vote against the Democratic candidate, because they dislike the Democrats' policies. Even among the cultified, there's a continuum. There's the full-blown nut jobs who fly giant Trump flags, wear their red MAGA hats wherever they go and will tell anyone within earshot how God saved him that day in Pennsylvania and that "he alone" can save our country. These are usually the same people who still believe that Hillary Clinton was running a pedophile ring in the basement of a pizza restaurant that didn't have a basement. There's the people who perhaps don't view Trump in religious terms but rationalize the January 6th riots at The Capitol as just another group of tourists and think that California legalized "abortion" after birth. There's the people who are convinced that Trump loves our country and is a godly man. He has convinced people that it's a good thing to be friendly with Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-Un but to antagonize and insult our allies. He has convinced his minions that the 2020 election was stolen and has people calling him "the rightful president", and is priming them to believe it again if he loses this year. 

Most Trump supporters will say that they don't agree with everything Trump does and don't put him on a pedestal, but won't admit to anything that they really disagree with and excuse and rationalize any behavior that they would abhor in anyone else. If that's not a cult, I don't know what is.