2018weekinreview

[2018weekinreview]

April 12: When Do We Reopen?

Well, it’s Easter. Which is when Trump initially wanted the economy reopened. Now he’s aiming for May 1st. Then again, when someone asked him what metrics he would use to decide, he pointed to his own head and said, these metrics, or some bullshit. It’s possible we’re flattening the curve in terms of coronavirus cases (currently at 530,000), which means social distancing might be working, but the death toll (20,600) is still rising. Meanwhile millions of people are unemployed. We still need testing. We still need Trump to stop going in front of reporters to downplay everything and basically wing it. And the pandemic seems to be hitting communities of color the hardest. So that probably needs to be addressed too. 

Bernie Sanders suspended his campaign. And Wisconsin held its primary amidst a ton of chaos.

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April 5: It’s Getting Worse

We’re still in a coronavirus shitstorm. We’ve seen 300,000 cases and over 8,400 deaths. Our hospitals are overwhelmed. There’s a shortage of ventilators and other crucial medical equipment. New York still seems to be the epicenter. But the worst of this is still coming. And we’re not ready. Mixed messaging on face masks, ‘stay at home’ orders, and other guidelines (plus the whole ‘months of dismissing it completely’ thing) have led to our best-case scenarios looking like 100,000-240,000 deaths. And that’s with everyone following the rules and practicing social distancing, which they are not. The economy is basically gone. Unemployment is at Depression levels. And the first bailout checks haven’t even gone out yet. But Trump has really high TV ratings. Jesus Christ. 

[2018weekinreview]

March 29: The Virus Makes The Timeline

It’s been a pretty sobering week. Hospitals are overwhelmed and in desperate need of supplies. The economy is shut down. Unemployment is at historic numbers. There are now over 125,000 COVID-19 cases in the United States, with over 2,100 deaths. New York has been the epicenter of the virus. But it keeps getting worse in cities everywhere. Congress passed a historic rescue bill. Trump had said he wanted everything back to normal by Easter. He questioned how many ventilators were needed. He’s attacked governors and floated the idea of placing New York under quarantine before backing down. It’s basically been irrelevant and counterproductive. But the country seems to want to come together and Trump’s polling is up to 48%. Hopefully everyone listens to scientists and governors instead. It’ll be the virus that decides when all of this ends. 

[2018weekinreview]

March 22: America Stops

America is shut down. Millions of people are staying at home (roughly 1/4 of the country). The streets of New York are empty. There’s no traffic in L.A. Schools and restaurants are closing and unemployment is soaring. All due to the coronavirus crisis, which now has 26,000 cases in the U.S. and 340 dead. It’s obviously a health crisis, where hospitals desperately need more ventilators and masks. But it’s also an economic crisis, and a trillion dollar relief package could be on the way soon. Trump’s leadership on this has been in question. And we probably lost precious response time as he dismissed concerns, sent mixed messages, contradicted experts, and tried to manipulate information to make his base and investors feel good. Maybe he’s changing his tone now, but Trump’s go-to personality (needing praise, lashing out at reporters) probably isn’t the best thing to have in an actual fucking crisis. Luckily governors have led on this. There’s talk of the Defense Protection Act to get enough ventilators and masks out there. And yeah, this is a historically disruptive time. And a time of historically low trust in the government. It’s not a good combination. But hopefully we can get through this. And hopefully we’ll have a plan on how to deal with this sort of thing going forward. Listen to experts. Wash your hands. 

[2018weekinreview]

March 15: National Emergency

Coronavirus is a global pandemic and a national emergency. There are now 3000 cases and 60 deaths in the U.S. All sports have been shut down. Schools are closing. Businesses too. The economy is taking a beating. France and Spain have joined Italy in public lockdowns. And Trump has tried to feed the public misinformation to benefit himself politically. He’s called it a hoax, compared it to the flu, said it would disappear, lied about testing. There’s been no leadership on this from the White House. Including an Oval Office address on Wednesday that was universally panned and immediately had to be cleaned up. None of this should be a partisan issue. Especially since we still don’t know how bad this is going to get. Or if our health system can handle this. At times like these, it would be nice to be able to trust the government. This is what everybody was afraid of when we elected a conman. 

In the midst of all of this crisis and insanity, Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders are going ahead with a debate. Biden’s victory is the foregone conclusion. Bernie’s job now is to move Biden to the Left. And Biden’s job is to avoid gaffes, like telling factory workers they’re full of shit. Good luck everybody.

[2018weekinreview]

March 8: A Virus Is Spreading

Coronavirus cases are spreading. There are now 100,000 cases in 100 different countries. Death tolls are rising. Events are being cancelled. Italy is on lockdown. The NCAA Tournament could be played in front of empty arenas. People are working from home. The U.S. has 400 cases in 30 states with 19 deaths. And Trump is either in complete denial about the severity of the crisis (he said he had a hunch it wouldn’t be so bad), he was completely unprepared for the crisis (there are a lack of test kits), or he just doesn’t want to spook the markets (which have tumbled). Probably a combination of all three. The Trump playbook of attacking the media, calling the governor of Washington a snake, installing loyalists, distrusting experts, and saying everything is perfect might not work this time around. And it could have implications on the election. 

Joe Biden won 10 states on Super Tuesday and cleared the field for a one-on-one contest with Bernie Sanders in the Democratic Primary. Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar, and Michael Bloomberg have all dropped out and endorsed Biden. Elizabeth Warren has also dropped out, but is yet to endorse Sanders. It was a surprisingly brilliant move by the Democratic establishment to close ranks around Biden that fast. And a complete reversal of fortune in the race. Everyone on the Sunday shows seems a lot more relaxed. Nobody is bringing up any of Biden’s obvious flaws. And now there are six states in play, including Michigan, on Tuesday.    

Mick Mulvaney is out as Trump’s Chief of Staff and Mark Meadows is now the #4 man in the job. 

[2018weekinreview]

March 1: South Carolina & Coronavirus

Joe Biden won big in South Carolina. He got 48% of the vote, with Bernie Sanders a distant second at 20%. And the Establishment wept tears of joy.  Tom Steyer, who outspent Biden 18-1 in South Carolina, finished third at 11% and dropped out of the race. So Biden’s firewall with black voters held. It’s possible that South Carolina is unique or that it’s more conservative or that Jim Clyburn played an outsized role in delivering Biden that victory. Because nobody had Biden winning that state by 29 points. So it’s not clear that any lessons can be drawn going forward. Now everyone is looking to Super Tuesday. Which will probably serve as the last hope for a lot of these lesser candidates. It’s also when Michael Bloomberg enters the race. Biden obviously wants to make this a two person race between himself and Sanders. But even the anti-Bernie press seems to be preparing for Bernie to take a commanding lead in the delegate count after Tuesday. Biden supporters are clinging to hopes in the southern states and with older black voters. Bernie leads with Latino voters. And early voting could hamper any bounce Biden got out of his big victory. Who will get out of the race? What will Bloomberg do? What will Bernie’s turnout be? We’ll probably find out a lot in a matter of days. 

Everyone is talking about coronavirus. That’s horrifying. The stock market plummeted this week. And this could become a pandemic. Trump played the whole thing like it was a hoax until we had our first death. And he put Mike Pence in charge of everything. Everyone is kinda hoping Trump doesn’t act like Trump during this whole thing.    

Trump also went to India this week.

[2018weekinreview]

February 23: Bernie Is The Frontrunner

Bernie Sanders is the clear frontrunner in the Democratic primary after he lapped everyone in the Nevada Caucus with 47% of the vote. And the establishment is freaking the fuck out about it. Sure, this was Joe Biden’s best showing, at 19%. He still leads in South Carolina (as of right now, but who knows). So maybe that’s something. And hilariously, the big savior of the establishment was supposed to be Michael Bloomberg. But he ate his own balls at the debate and flatlined so hard that not even endless piles of cash can buy his way out of that. Jesus, that was bad. So Bernie is The Guy heading into Super Tuesday and, with no clear alternative, nobody knows how to stop him. Which reminds everyone of Trump in 2016. An election he won. Yes, they’re going to call Bernie a socialist, which in this case means he has popular policies with a less popular label. They’re also warning about losing the House and Senate with Bernie at the top of the ticket. Or they’re conditioning everyone for a brokered convention. But that scenario would basically destroy the party and assure a Trump victory. Not that the establishment would necessarily mind that. So the plan is to try to stop Bernie without looking like they’re trying to stop Bernie. Never mind his grassroots organization and his broad coalition of enthusiastic voters, which is growing by the day. Maybe it’s too late for the party brass. Because last time I checked, they’re not the only ones who get to vote. I’ll wait for everyone else to get that memo.

The new thing is that Russia is trying to help Trump again. But they’re also trying to help Bernie. Trump obviously won’t accept this information. And he just fired somebody over it. So the intelligence community is in chaos. All while William Barr gets criticism. Or something. I stopped listening to Russia shit. 

[2018weekinreview]

February 16: Nevada, South Carolina, Super Tuesday and Trump’s Vengeance

The Nevada Caucus is on Saturday. Then South Carolina and Super Tuesday are right around the corner. Bernie Sanders won the popular vote in Iowa and New Hampshire, but Pete Buttigieg has a delegate lead. Nobody seems willing to declare a frontrunner in this thing (especially since Pete did well in predominantly white states but has no minority support going forward), but Bernie and his supporters have everyone in the establishment freaking the fuck out. So they’re downplaying his victories, or his turnout, or they’re saying if the moderates can rally around one candidate, they can stop him. Assuming voters even think the same way pundits do. But so far they’re not rallying around one alternative candidate and now Michael Bloomberg is entering the race. Amy Klobuchar finished 3rd in New Hampshire and got most of the positive press out of it. But she has low support going forward. Joe Biden, the previous frontrunner, had horrible finishes in Iowa and New Hampshire. And he basically has to win South Carolina or he’s done. But Biden’s support among black voters might be going down and that firewall we keep hearing about might not hold. The real wild card is Bloomberg. He can just keep dumping piles of money into everything until the end of time. But he has a past littered with stop and frisk policies, horrible comments about those stop and frisk policies, and horrible comments about women that would have probably been disqualifying in a pre-Trump era. But apparently a lot of people think the best way to beat a horrible billionaire is with a richer horrible billionaire or something.     

The hilarious-looking Roger Stone was looking at a 7-9 year sentence until Trump tweeted that it was unfair and then the DOJ intervened on Stone’s behalf. Which led four prosecutors to leave the case. This was all part of Trump’s post-impeachment vengeance tour against his enemies. So William Barr had to come out and say that Trump’s tweets make it impossible for him to do his job. The DOJ probably shouldn’t be Trump’s personal protection and punishment service. But Trump is still steaming mad at James Comey and Andrew McCabe. And wants t0 protect Stone and Michael Flynn. And yeah, he didn’t learn any sort of lessons from impeachment. The problem is, Barr probably didn’t need much coaxing in the first place.         

Also… 

That photo of Trump’s makeup.

[2018weekinreview]

February 9: Lesson Learned

The Iowa Caucuses and that goddamned app were a confusing and embarrassing shit show for the Democrats. The media is playing it like Pete Buttigieg won or tied the caucuses (nothing weird at all here, folks). And now the New Hampshire primary is two days away. Buttigeig appears to have gotten a bump out of Iowa. But in New Hampshire, he’s still in second place (22%) to Bernie Sanders (24%), who also happens to be the other candidate with a strong claim to a victory in the Hawkeye State. I think the candidates know that Bernie’s supporters aren’t leaving him, so Pete was the biggest target in the most recent debate. And yeah, there’s probably some legitimate concern about Pete’s record in South Bend and, thus, his support from black voters. The person hurt the most by Pete’s rise in the polls is seemingly Joe Biden, who did not do well in Iowa. And he’s currently 4th (10%) in New Hampshire. Biden was betting everything on South Carolina, but the campaign is flailing and he’s running out of money. And I could talk about Elizabeth Warren or Amy Klobuchar or Tom Steyer, but it’s probably all a moot point for what’s to come. The party is terrified of a Sanders nomination. They do not want him there. That part is clear. So the goal is to have the race be so muddled, that the nomination process gets to a second ballot at the convention. And then Michael Bloomberg, a man with no base of support other than stockpiles of money, will buy his way to the nomination. Then everyone will be told to rally around the candidate to beat Donald Trump. The good news is, the party might be equally scared of Sanders’ voters. But the whole thing could end just as gross and terrible as it started. Fun. 

Trump had a good week, if you ask the same pundits. He gave the State of the Union address (where Nancy Pelosi ripped up his speech) and the talking heads noticed his outreach to black voters. Even though that was a ploy to make women in the suburbs less scared of him.

Trump was also acquitted by the Republican Senate in his impeachment trial. Without any witnesses. Although Mitt Romney voted to convict him. But Trump’s approval went to a high of 49% and he knows Republicans will let him do whatever the fuck he wants. People like Susan Collins and Lamar Alexander had said Trump learned a lesson from his impeachment, but he’s mostly been on a vindictive rampage, firing Alexander Vindman and Gordon Sondland and attacking Adam Schiff, as well as Pelosi. Lesson learned.

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February 2: Iowa and Acquittal

The Iowa Caucuses are tomorrow. And The Des Moines Register polling got screwed up, so everybody is extra confused about what’s gonna happen. The establishment just knows it’s freaked the fuck out by the Sanders campaign. Hillary Clinton is attacking him. The pundits are screaming about socialism. They’re also screaming about the need to get moderate voters. Or that Bernie’s not really a Democrat. Or they worry he’ll win Iowa and New Hampshire and then run the table before Michael Bloomberg can jump into the race. And then in the very next segment they’ll show a poll with Bernie beating Trump nationally by 4 points. Or they’ll show him leading the national polls. Or they’ll mention he has a 2-1 money advantage over Joe Biden. Or that he has the most enthusiastic supporters. Then some of them will concede that Bernie could probably beat Trump in the midwest states that flipped in 2016.  And they worry that the establishment could actually validate Bernie by attacking him. The fact is that they have no idea, especially about electability, as they’ve proven repeatedly. Biden looks weak to these same pundits. Even though he’s second in national polling and he also beats Trump by 6 points. But he could finish as low as 4th in Iowa. Which kind of fucks his only message, which is electability. So the big moderate savior, according to Sunday show pundits, is going to be Michael Bloomberg, who has all the money in the world, but is an opportunistic Republican that nobody likes. The press seems done with Elizabeth Warren and Pete Buttigeig, even though they also beat Trump in the national polls. Everyone agrees that a lot of things can happen between now and November, but Trump is going to run on the economy. Which they are confident is a good economy.  

Trump is going to be acquitted in the impeachment trial this week. So he is going to claim exoneration at the State of the Union, even though there were no witnesses and Senate Republicans basically agreed that Trump did the thing, but that it wasn’t worth removing him from office. That’s where Lamar Alexander landed. And that’s basically where the country is at too. Democrats are saying the trial was a sham. Republicans are saying this was purely partisan. But they might have also responded to it an overly partisan way and could be seen as equally corrupt enablers of Trump. Or that they ceded their checks and balances to the executive branch. Which gets kinda scary. Everyone seemly agrees that more information is going to come out about this. John Bolton sure has a lot to say. So nobody is sure if this will factor into the election. November is a long way away. So who knows, he might get impeached again between now and then.

Happy Super Bowl.

[2018weekinreview]

January 26: Witnesses?

The impeachment trial is underway. Both sides are making their cases to people who have already made up their minds. We still don’t know if we’re gonna see witnesses. John Bolton keeps coming up as a bombshell witness. And Lev Parnas has recordings of Trump saying to get rid of Marie Yovanovitch. But there still has to be four Republicans to agree to witness testimony. And there’s no real political incentive for them to do that. Everyone seems to agree that the truth will come out at some point. Or that the House should have gotten this evidence already. There’s also the threat of dragging Joe and Hunter Biden into this. Or Adam Schiff. It probably doesn’t matter. The needle hasn’t really moved either way.     

The Iowa Caucuses are 8 days away. Joe Biden (28) and Bernie Sanders (24) seem to be pulling away, nationally. But Bernie is surging in Iowa (25) and New Hampshire (22). Especially with younger and more idealistic voters. Buttigeig is second in Iowa (18) and New Hampshire (17), which could be a threat to Biden with older and more moderate voters. So what happens when Biden finishes third in both states? Things will start shaking out real soon. 

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January 19: Trial

Nancy Pelosi had the House send the articles of impeachment to the Senate. So there’s gonna be a trial beginning this week. New evidence has come out about Rudy Giuliani and this Lev Parnas guy. And how Trump was trying to get dirt on Joe Biden from Ukraine and threaten Marie Yavanovich. And Parnas apparently left notes to himself about it. We still don’t know if the Senate will consider new evidence or even witnesses. Republicans (and Alan Dershowitz) are saying the Democrats just want to overturn the 2016 election and that Trump did nothing wrong or that his conduct was not impeachable. Democrats are saying the Founders had this specifically in mind when they put impeachment into the Constitution and that foreign interference into our elections is bad. A conviction looks highly unlikely at this point. There are political implications for both sides. And while they keep trying to compare this to the Clinton trial, I’m guessing significantly fewer people even care. 

Elizabeth Warren turned down Bernie Sanders’ handshake after the debate. Does this divide progressives and help Joe Biden?

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January 12: Impeachment, Iran, and Iowa

Nancy Pelosi is probably going to send the articles of impeachment to the Senate this week. Without any concessions from Mitch McConnell on witnesses. That’s a victory for McConnell. But Mitt Romney and Susan Collins might want to hear from John Bolton. You need four Republican Senators to make that happen. Who fucking knows? 

Trump had one of Iran’s top generals, Qassem Suleimani, killed in Iraq. And Iran’s retaliation had no casualties so Trump declared victory. But the Trump administration also has shifting explanations on the intelligence that led to Suleimani’s killing. Was there an imminent threat? Was he going to blow up a bunch of embassies? Why make shit up if the killing of this general was lawful and positive? Why piss off the people who were otherwise just grumpy about the process? Anyway, now there are protests in Iran over the downing of a Ukrainian commercial jet, which the Iranians have admitted was an error. So this is developing.

The Iowa Caucuses are just three weeks away. New polling shows Bernie Sanders at 20%, Elizabeth Warren at 17%, Pete Buttigeig at 16% and Joe Biden at 15%. It’s a four-way sprint, according to the Sunday shows. But the impeachment trial could complicate things for Senators Sanders and Warren. Especially if the trial also bleeds into New Hampshire. Bernie does have loyal support so maybe he’s fine. The Bernie and Biden campaigns also seem to be benefitting, to a certain extent, from the violence in the Middle East. Biden can say he has national security and foreign policy experience. Even though that experience was mostly terrible. And Bernie can say he was against the Iraq War (John Kerry and Hillary Clinton voted for it and lost, Obama was against it and won). And he can tie it into his overall case of focusing on the problems at home. 

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January 5: The Killing of Qasem Soleimani

Donald Trump probably just made his biggest gamble or the most consequential decision of his presidency by killing Iran’s top military commander, Qasem Soleimani. Tensions in the region had been growing, with attacks on Saudi Arabia and on our embassy in Baghdad. But this was apparently something that was avoided by presidents Bush and Obama, as well as by Israel, out of the risk of sparking a war with Iran. Trump has since said that he did this to stop a war, not start a war. And his administration has tried to justify the attack by saying this guy was a terrorist, that he’d killed hundreds of Americans, and that he was planning imminent attacks. But we know they’ll lie about anything from inauguration crowd sizes to using a using Sharpies to alter hurricane maps. So it’s easy to have doubts about what we’re being told about how this makes us safer. Iran is obviously vowing revenge. So there’s speculation about what that would look like. Trump is sending 3,500 more troops to the region. He’s also vowing targeted attacks on 52 different cultural and political sites in the region (to match the number of hostages in 1979). Which is also a war crime. So we might be looking at the prospects of another endless war in the Middle East. Which Trump campaigned against. And there are comparisons to the run up to the Iraq War. Or speculations on how this is a distraction from impeachment. It has to be brought up that Trump claimed, no multiple occasions, that Obama would start a war with Iran to help his reelection. So yeah. It looks like bullshit. We just don’t know if it’ll be felt for decades or if it’ll be out of the news by Wednesday.  

So which Democratic candidate does this help in the election? Biden and Buttigeig? Bernie? He’s recently gone after Biden for his Iraq War baggage. 

There’s an impeachment stalemate in the Senate between Mitch McConnell and Chuck Schumer. 

[2018weekinreview]

December 22: Delayed Articles

Happy Holidays. Happy Hanukkah. Merry Christmas. Donald Trump became the 3rd president in history to be impeached. As of now, Nancy Pelosi is delaying everything by not sending the articles to the Senate, where an acquittal is a foregone conclusion, until notorious schemer, Mitch McConnell, assures a fair trial with witnesses like Mick Mulvaney and John Bolton. The Senate is 53-47 Republican and they’d need 67 votes for a conviction. It’s not going to happen. We’re hyper partisan. Trump has an 89% job approval with Republicans (43-44% overall). Nixon’s was at 48%. Which is probably the main reason this otherwise historic event feels like it doesn’t matter. Bill Clinton had a high approval rating, nobody wanted him impeached and still everyone tuned in. We’re fucking exhausted. No factual argument will sway Trump’s base. Terrible precedents are being set. And the actual story seems to be how this will all play into the 2020 election.   

Speaking of which, there was another Democratic debate. Pete Buttigeig and his wine cave became a target for people like Amy Klobuchar and Elizabeth Warren. The pundits loved his response for some reason. Joe Biden got praise for making it all the way through the debate without any giant gaffes. He’s still leading at 28%. Bernie is at 21%. Warren is at 18%. Then Buttigeig, Klobuchar, Bloomberg and Yang are in single digits. Biden could dip if he loses Iowa and New Hampshire. Basically, a lot can happen.

Christianity Today bashed Trump. It won’t change anything.

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December 15: The Battle Of What Happens After This

For only the 4th time in history, Congress is voting to impeach a president. Which means, for the first time in history, an impeached president will be on the ballot during an election. And nobody cares. We’re too partisan. The facts don’t matter as much as the desired outcome. We know the Senate is going to acquit. The entirety of the Trump presidency has been met with hysterical media coverage. And this just feels like another freakout where nothing will happen. It’s not Bill Clinton in 1998. It’s Brett Kavanaugh last year. And we’ve already begun the battle of what happens in the aftermath of all this. Between now and the election, more information will probably come out. It’s just a matter of which side will be more angry in November. There are also political calculations to consider. There are swing state and otherwise vulnerable Senators. Jeff Van Drew had to switch parties in New Jersey because of his impeachment vote and his upcoming Democratic primary. The real battle seems like it’ll happen when all of this is over. But again, we’ll have to wait and see.    

Boris Johnson won a landslide victory in the UK. So we have to decide if that’s a warning sign for 2020 Democrats. James Carville thinks so. So does everyone horrified by the prospects of a Bernie Sanders presidency. Or I guess, an Elizabeth Warren presidency. Or anyone repeating that the party is moving too far to the Left. It’s entirely possible that Jeremy Corbyn was really unpopular and did not have a clear stance on Brexit. It’s possible that Labour did not have an answer to right wing populism. Or that Corbyn symbolized more disruption. But we might be overthinking it. As of now, Bernie isn’t going anywhere. Biden and Buttigeig are holding the center, but have major flaws. So the donors really want Amy Klobuchar to get another look. If the impeachment trial goes long, it could keep Warren, Sanders, Klobuchar and Cory Booker in Washington and forced to stay quiet. Who fucking knows?      

Teenage climate activist, Greta Thunberg was named Time’s person of the year.