I'll say it again: the two biggest mistakes we can make heading into 2024 are assuming Trump can't possibly win, and assuming Trump definitely will win.
Sargent is right, we need to keep on keepin' on, definitely, but if you want to see how "smart" people can be co-opted by Trump and fall into the "he isn't any worse than the Biden Administration", watch Liz Cheney on CNBC this morning trying to convince Joe Kernen that Trump is a threat. He simply doesn't see it. He is generally rude, and he fillibustered for a bit until she asked if he would let her speak.
He is no doubt voicing all the talking points that Republicans have been parroting for decades. But turning this ship around is going to take A LOT of work and a little bit of luck.
The case against despair remains firmly rooted in watching the GOP continue to dick punch themselves with ever more restrictive assaults on a woman's right to control her bodily autonomy. The more they double down on legislation that effectively makes abortion illegal the more confident I get that polling can take a long walk off a short pier. Women and young voters are going to SPANK the GOP for this, I firmly believe. Now that's not to say voting restrictions and the electoral college and sundry incursions against proper ballot counting by GOP operatives is not wildly concerning, but overall, I don't think the media really understands the full force of the anger out there.
Maybe it's time for all the never trumpers AND those GOP donors who have money but also a significant amount of cowardice to start publicly support the Dem in the race?
Your party is gone. Your agenda is Project 2025 and a national abortion ban and (again) repealing the Affordable Health Care legislation. Oh, and Putin owns your ass.
Nice job; here is your participation trophy; good luck.
We've beaten Trump before, we can beat him again--and we need to remember these things. Biden simply has to maintain his numbers since 2020 while Trump has to grow them beyond his 2020 vote share. Trump's anti-vaxx base has been dying of CV since 2020, so he may actually need to grow his numbers beyond what he had in 2020 to make up the difference. He will be consumed by a rolling series of trials that are going to bring out his worst emotional reactions. Economic sentiment of voters will improve between now and the election as the lag effect of consumer sentiment comes around. Don't get complacent about 2024, but there are more tailwinds than headwinds for Biden in the cumulative picture in my mind. Highlight the dangers a 2nd Trump presidency would bring, but don't lose sight of the strengths going for Biden--including incumbency--and the weaknesses that Trump has. Negative polarization runs modern politics and we have to make less than 100,000 voters in about 4-5 states dislike Trump enough to not vote for him. That's it. That's the whole mission.
If I were Biden and his team, I would make most of my campaigning be about the dangers of a 2nd Trump presidency. Remind voters that he tried to refuse leaving the WH in 2021 and would do so again if ever elected back to office--effectively ending democracy on the spot. Compare Trump to Elon--a decadently rich billionaire with serious mental health issues who refuses to listen to anybody and only wants things his way. Remind voters that Trump is a public opinion scam artist on abortion who flips--pretending to be unserious about it and then putting x3 SCOTUS justices on the bench who then take a 50+ year right away from women. Remind voters that Trump tried to start a war with Iran by publicly assassinating their top general who was a national hero. Remind voters that Trump wants to use the military against non-violent protests like he did at Lafayette Square and would do so again in a remake of Kent State. Remind voters that Trump is a 91-count-indicted criminal who cheats on his wife, cheats on his taxes, and cheats at elections. Just keep hammering home what a danger Trump is to the country and its body politic over and over and over again and use examples from Trump's first presidency and his own words against him. Do this, and the results will go our way.
I seem to recall some patrician guy in a wheelchair once said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
I don’t want to pat ourselves on the back too hard, but we are a bipartisan group of smart, kind, and articulate people. We are natural leaders. It’s up to us to motivate, cajole, and win over our fellow citizens to vote Biden, or at least, stay home and not vote for Trump. We can’t afford to be paralyzed by anxiety.
Let Sarah Longwell’s roll up the sleeve attitude motivate us. Let’s win.
Charlie, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for this column.
Yes, be aware of the dangers and threats facing us, but don't give in to them.
That's one of the reasons why i post the links to Simon Rosenberg (would love to hear him as a guest on one of your pods) and the Trump trial countdowns.
Thanks for writing on Greg Sargent’s opinion piece, Charlie. 🙏
Hoping to hear Liz Cheney on the podcast soon. I have her book, but haven’t gotten far into it yet as it arrived late yesterday.
Got a nice tidbit from the Rachel Maddow interview. Apparently, my congresswoman is reading my letters. Huzzah!
Cheney: I had heard this complaint from Stefanik who told me because of my vote to impeach people were writing letters to the editors of her newspapers criticizing her and asking her why she hadn't taken the same stand that I had.
Andrew Tate is an icky moron with a 16 year old brain. He is definitely a Republican - withhold birth control & abortion, use your charm or muscle to spread your seed far and wide, retire nightly to your snug nest in Mom's basement after she reheats your dinner, then get on your blog to rage about welfare queens & bad parenting yielding poor, criminal progeny. What a truly useless excuse for a human.
Rachel Maddow and Liz Cheney agree! Charlie Sykes and AOC agree! We have to get rid of Trump and vanquish the MAGA Republican Party on every level. We are fighting against a brilliantly manipulative sociopath and the billionaires backing the Heritage Society. The only way we have to do this is to back the reelection of President Biden. He is pretty much the centrist that the country wants. Trump will help us. He is getting crazier and more dangerous by the day. His apologists are really bending into pretzels or else they are already as crazy and dangerous as the new House Speaker. Keep the pressure on. Jack Smith will help. Send money. Talk to your Fox News friends. they don't get to hear the worse of him.
This line re: "...political organizing among formerly apathetic middle-aged women to defend democracy, fueling Democrats’ 2018 midterm blowout" put front and center in my mind the paternalistic misogyny that is Fox and it's look alike shows, with all the women regressed to looking like retouched Barbies. I love the fact that middle age women, as well as older and younger, are coming out in droves. Amy Klobochar, who finally forced the rule on military promotions, Liz Cheney on her campaign, are among the women impacting change.
This comment is a follow-on from the last few days of Morning Shots comments rather than a specific response to today’s column (which was great). People have been saying a lot, “Yes, but what can we do?” This is not something to do, but it lists some tools that may help you do whatever you decide to do.
I went down the internet wormhole yesterday looking for fact-checking resources, and these are the best I came up with.* I wanted to share them in case they’re useful to anyone else. To confirm: this is not a URL dump; I only picked out the ones that seemed to the point and helpful.
If anyone has more, maybe you could share them in the replies?
---------------------------------------------
SHORT AND SWEET POSTER-STYLE ADVICE ON HOW TO EVALUATE A SOURCE:
* I was hoping to find a resource that would be universally accepted as a starting point, but I guess that’s impossible in these fractured times. These seemed about as neutral and credible as you can get.
** Honestly, given how important this stuff is, you’d think they could give them more promotable URLs.
*** Some of these are older so they don’t cover, for example, AI or the mainstreaming of crazy. I’d love to see more on how to meet challenges like that.
**** Kate, you had more, but I couldn’t get the URLs to open off my screen shot and I couldn’t find your original post.
Mike Johnson is such a perfect embodiment of the GOP mindset - the justice system must be thwarted if it tries to enforce the law against our people and must also be used to attack and harm people who haven't committed any wrongdoing if they're not our people.
He fits to a T the perfect description that Liz Cheney attaches to these "patriots" - collaborators. We should all use that word to describe the Trump coup enablers and fan boys. Collaborators.
I'll say it again: the two biggest mistakes we can make heading into 2024 are assuming Trump can't possibly win, and assuming Trump definitely will win.
Sargent is right, we need to keep on keepin' on, definitely, but if you want to see how "smart" people can be co-opted by Trump and fall into the "he isn't any worse than the Biden Administration", watch Liz Cheney on CNBC this morning trying to convince Joe Kernen that Trump is a threat. He simply doesn't see it. He is generally rude, and he fillibustered for a bit until she asked if he would let her speak.
He is no doubt voicing all the talking points that Republicans have been parroting for decades. But turning this ship around is going to take A LOT of work and a little bit of luck.
The case against despair remains firmly rooted in watching the GOP continue to dick punch themselves with ever more restrictive assaults on a woman's right to control her bodily autonomy. The more they double down on legislation that effectively makes abortion illegal the more confident I get that polling can take a long walk off a short pier. Women and young voters are going to SPANK the GOP for this, I firmly believe. Now that's not to say voting restrictions and the electoral college and sundry incursions against proper ballot counting by GOP operatives is not wildly concerning, but overall, I don't think the media really understands the full force of the anger out there.
Maybe it's time for all the never trumpers AND those GOP donors who have money but also a significant amount of cowardice to start publicly support the Dem in the race?
Your party is gone. Your agenda is Project 2025 and a national abortion ban and (again) repealing the Affordable Health Care legislation. Oh, and Putin owns your ass.
Nice job; here is your participation trophy; good luck.
We've beaten Trump before, we can beat him again--and we need to remember these things. Biden simply has to maintain his numbers since 2020 while Trump has to grow them beyond his 2020 vote share. Trump's anti-vaxx base has been dying of CV since 2020, so he may actually need to grow his numbers beyond what he had in 2020 to make up the difference. He will be consumed by a rolling series of trials that are going to bring out his worst emotional reactions. Economic sentiment of voters will improve between now and the election as the lag effect of consumer sentiment comes around. Don't get complacent about 2024, but there are more tailwinds than headwinds for Biden in the cumulative picture in my mind. Highlight the dangers a 2nd Trump presidency would bring, but don't lose sight of the strengths going for Biden--including incumbency--and the weaknesses that Trump has. Negative polarization runs modern politics and we have to make less than 100,000 voters in about 4-5 states dislike Trump enough to not vote for him. That's it. That's the whole mission.
If I were Biden and his team, I would make most of my campaigning be about the dangers of a 2nd Trump presidency. Remind voters that he tried to refuse leaving the WH in 2021 and would do so again if ever elected back to office--effectively ending democracy on the spot. Compare Trump to Elon--a decadently rich billionaire with serious mental health issues who refuses to listen to anybody and only wants things his way. Remind voters that Trump is a public opinion scam artist on abortion who flips--pretending to be unserious about it and then putting x3 SCOTUS justices on the bench who then take a 50+ year right away from women. Remind voters that Trump tried to start a war with Iran by publicly assassinating their top general who was a national hero. Remind voters that Trump wants to use the military against non-violent protests like he did at Lafayette Square and would do so again in a remake of Kent State. Remind voters that Trump is a 91-count-indicted criminal who cheats on his wife, cheats on his taxes, and cheats at elections. Just keep hammering home what a danger Trump is to the country and its body politic over and over and over again and use examples from Trump's first presidency and his own words against him. Do this, and the results will go our way.
89 days until Trump's J6 trial starts.
I seem to recall some patrician guy in a wheelchair once said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
I don’t want to pat ourselves on the back too hard, but we are a bipartisan group of smart, kind, and articulate people. We are natural leaders. It’s up to us to motivate, cajole, and win over our fellow citizens to vote Biden, or at least, stay home and not vote for Trump. We can’t afford to be paralyzed by anxiety.
Let Sarah Longwell’s roll up the sleeve attitude motivate us. Let’s win.
Charlie, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for this column.
Yes, be aware of the dangers and threats facing us, but don't give in to them.
That's one of the reasons why i post the links to Simon Rosenberg (would love to hear him as a guest on one of your pods) and the Trump trial countdowns.
As the kids used to say, we got this fam.
Thanks for writing on Greg Sargent’s opinion piece, Charlie. 🙏
Hoping to hear Liz Cheney on the podcast soon. I have her book, but haven’t gotten far into it yet as it arrived late yesterday.
Got a nice tidbit from the Rachel Maddow interview. Apparently, my congresswoman is reading my letters. Huzzah!
Cheney: I had heard this complaint from Stefanik who told me because of my vote to impeach people were writing letters to the editors of her newspapers criticizing her and asking her why she hadn't taken the same stand that I had.
Andrew Tate is an icky moron with a 16 year old brain. He is definitely a Republican - withhold birth control & abortion, use your charm or muscle to spread your seed far and wide, retire nightly to your snug nest in Mom's basement after she reheats your dinner, then get on your blog to rage about welfare queens & bad parenting yielding poor, criminal progeny. What a truly useless excuse for a human.
Rachel Maddow and Liz Cheney agree! Charlie Sykes and AOC agree! We have to get rid of Trump and vanquish the MAGA Republican Party on every level. We are fighting against a brilliantly manipulative sociopath and the billionaires backing the Heritage Society. The only way we have to do this is to back the reelection of President Biden. He is pretty much the centrist that the country wants. Trump will help us. He is getting crazier and more dangerous by the day. His apologists are really bending into pretzels or else they are already as crazy and dangerous as the new House Speaker. Keep the pressure on. Jack Smith will help. Send money. Talk to your Fox News friends. they don't get to hear the worse of him.
"Being alarmed is one thing. Despair is quite another." Right on!
This line re: "...political organizing among formerly apathetic middle-aged women to defend democracy, fueling Democrats’ 2018 midterm blowout" put front and center in my mind the paternalistic misogyny that is Fox and it's look alike shows, with all the women regressed to looking like retouched Barbies. I love the fact that middle age women, as well as older and younger, are coming out in droves. Amy Klobochar, who finally forced the rule on military promotions, Liz Cheney on her campaign, are among the women impacting change.
This comment is a follow-on from the last few days of Morning Shots comments rather than a specific response to today’s column (which was great). People have been saying a lot, “Yes, but what can we do?” This is not something to do, but it lists some tools that may help you do whatever you decide to do.
I went down the internet wormhole yesterday looking for fact-checking resources, and these are the best I came up with.* I wanted to share them in case they’re useful to anyone else. To confirm: this is not a URL dump; I only picked out the ones that seemed to the point and helpful.
If anyone has more, maybe you could share them in the replies?
---------------------------------------------
SHORT AND SWEET POSTER-STYLE ADVICE ON HOW TO EVALUATE A SOURCE:
https://blogs.ifla.org/lpa/files/2017/01/How-to-Spot-Fake-News.pdf
https://projectlooksharp.org/our-approach.php#handouts (scroll down to Categories and Sample Questions for Media Decoding) **
---------------------------------------------
ARTICLE-LENGTH ADVICE***
HARVARD
https://usingsources.fas.harvard.edu/evaluating-sources-0
CBC CANADA
(the first is background/context, the second has more how-to)
https://www.cbc.ca/news/science/fake-news-misinformation-online-1.5196865
https://www.cbc.ca/news/science/fake-news-disinformation-propaganda-internet-1.5196964
NPR
https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2016/12/05/503581220/fake-or-real-how-to-self-check-the-news-and-get-the-facts
---------------------------------------------
FACT-CHECKING SITES
https://www.politifact.com/
https://www.factcheck.org/
https://www.snopes.com/
https://citizenevidence.org/2014/07/01/youtube-dataviewer/
https://www.npr.org/sections/politics-fact-check
https://apnews.com/ap-fact-check
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/
---------------------------------------------
MORE provided recently by @Kate Fall — one roundup and one health-specific — thanks again Kate!****
https://library.csi.cuny.edu/c.php?g=619342&p=4310783
https://www.ucsfhealth.org/education/evaluating-health-information
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NOTES
* I was hoping to find a resource that would be universally accepted as a starting point, but I guess that’s impossible in these fractured times. These seemed about as neutral and credible as you can get.
** Honestly, given how important this stuff is, you’d think they could give them more promotable URLs.
*** Some of these are older so they don’t cover, for example, AI or the mainstreaming of crazy. I’d love to see more on how to meet challenges like that.
**** Kate, you had more, but I couldn’t get the URLs to open off my screen shot and I couldn’t find your original post.
Mike Johnson is such a perfect embodiment of the GOP mindset - the justice system must be thwarted if it tries to enforce the law against our people and must also be used to attack and harm people who haven't committed any wrongdoing if they're not our people.
He fits to a T the perfect description that Liz Cheney attaches to these "patriots" - collaborators. We should all use that word to describe the Trump coup enablers and fan boys. Collaborators.
He's not being held responsible at all. If he were, he'd be in custody for threatening witnesses, judges, and other officers of the court.