"Among many Americans, [Biden] is blamed for wars started by other countries that national security veterans nonetheless credit him with navigating maturely..."

"... despite their own criticisms. He has not found a message on the economy that resonates more than the price of milk and eggs. Neither his persona nor his vision travel on today’s hyperactive, hypersonic, hyper-sensational social media the way that former President Donald J. Trump’s do. TikTok voters are not checking Mr. Biden’s legislative scorecard. 'It doesn’t mean a lot now because we’re in such a performative age,” said former Representative Eric Cantor of Virginia.... 'He’s just not equipped in this era we’re in of social media and constant scrutiny. The tools and attributes and talents that he may have had just don’t quite fit or lend themselves to the era we’re in.'"

From "Joe Biden: The Old-School Politician in a New-School Era/After more than half a century in Washington, President Biden has learned to make deals and work across the aisle. But that instinct is rarely rewarded in today’s political climate" (by Peter Baker in the NYT).

Remember Eric Cantor?

Sarah Palin: "I think Paul Ryan is about to be Cantored — as in Eric Cantor."

That was in answer to a question from Jake Tapper, just now, on his Sunday show, about what she thought of Paul Ryan's statement — after saying he would support the GOP nominee — that he was not yet ready to support Donald Trump.

She continued: "His political career is over, because he has so disrespected the will of the people. As the leader of the GOP — the convention, certainly — he is to remain neutral and for him to already come out and say who he will not support was not a wise decision of his."

To be clear, Ryan's statement was: "I'm just not ready to do that at this point. I'm not there right now." Is it fair to paraphrase that as saying "who he will not support"? The inaccurate word is "will." If she'd said "who he does not support," she'd be fine.

But "about to be Cantored" is the memorable language. Very harsh. Maybe you also jumped at "His political career is over." What happened to her political career?

"Boehner’s departure *not* bigger than Cantor loss. Cantor a terrifying vote of the people."

 Says Mickey Kaus, disagreeing with a CNN piece that says: "Boehner's departure might be the conservative right's most famous get yet -- even bigger than the coup against his former lieutenant Eric Cantor in a primary election in 2014."

"Sometimes, a Jewish person just wants to be able to go to Congress and speak with a Jewish person..."

"And Chuck Schumer is not it for us," said a Jewish person the NYT found in the hotel lobby after a meeting of the Republican Jewish Coalition, quoted in "Republican Jews Alarmed at the Prospect of a Void in the House and Senate."

Emerging trend: Democrats insinuating that Republican politicians are gay.

I'm saying this is a trend to watch, because I'm seeing the second example of something within one week.

Last weekend, I noticed that the Alec MacGillis hit piece on Scott Walker in The New Republic, which was mostly racial politics, had some material that I believe was intended to float the rumor that Scott Walker is a closeted gay man.

And today, here's CNN reporting that Former Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer recently said in an interview:

"If you were just a regular person, you turned on the TV, and you saw Eric Cantor talking, I would say — and I'm fine with gay people, that's all right — but my gaydar is 60-70 percent."

"Don't hold this against me, but I'm going to blurt it out. How do I say this ... men in the South, they are a little effeminate... They just have effeminate mannerisms."

Now, I had to Google Schweitzer's name to find out that he's a Democrat, so that CNN article is also an example of another much more well-documented trend: mainstream media omitting the party affiliation of a Democrat who says or does anything bad or stupid (or submerging the party affiliation under enough boring paragraphs that it's as good as omitted).

Anyway, why would Schweitzer say something so stupid? It makes no sense. Should non-gay people be talking about their "gaydar"? Who brags about 60-70% gaydar? That seems like a high fail rate. And if he's not himself looking for sexual adventures, how does he know whether he's right or not, especially as he's purporting to detect gayness in men who are not openly gay? And, worst of all, if he thinks Southern men are just effeminate, doesn't that imply that Cantor would fall within the 30-40% who set off Schweitzer's gaydar but are not gay? I guess Schweitzer — who admits he knows he's just blurting crap out — just wanted to say that Cantor seems gay and then to take it back by saying, oh, but he's Southern, and Southern men always seem gay to me — which gratuitously insults both Southern men and gay men (and, in a way, women!).

How could Schweitzer go that badly wrong? Where did all that come from. Here's my suspicion. He operates with a backroom culture where people really do talk like that. The idea of floating the rumor that a Republican politician is gay comes up all the time, as does the idea that Southern men seem gay because they are effeminate. But the strategy would be to say something that puts the idea in our head without actually saying it. It's not the talking point, but the secret notes behind the talking point. Schweitzer just blurted out the secret notes.

Schweitzer seems to be really dumb. The trick is to do it in a smart way, so it's deniable and the person calling you on it seems delusional or weird. For example, back in 2005, I blogged about how I thought that the NYT tried to create the impression that Supreme Court nominee John Roberts was gay. I pointed to a lot of things about the NYT's presentation, including a photo layout that included Roberts wearing plaid pants. I got pushed back, ridiculed for talking about plaid pants. The NYT had the deniability it sought if, in fact, it sought to put that idea in my head.

This is a technique that requires some skill and subtlety, so if there is an idea in that Democratic Party backroom to screw up Republicans with gay rumors, they'd better take care who they let into that room. They've got to keep that kind of strategizing in the closet. They'd better have some good radar about who's too dumb/inarticulate to work that game. They've got to filter out the Schweitzers.

Meanwhile, you've got MacGillis (on Walker) and the writers and editors who put together that John Roberts piece. These are people who are capable of playing a subtler game, and that's the game I'm watching... in case it's really happening.

I need a good tag for this trend watch, but for now I'll revive the old "plaidgate."

ADDED: I think Obama used this technique on Romney back in April 2012.

AND: I've decided to make the new tag "homophobia politics."

"There’s no GOP establishment/Tea Party divide, and there never has been."

Wrote WaPo's Greg Sargent last May.

So today, when incumbent Republicans are threatened from the right by Tea Party challenges, they don’t react by moving right in any substantive way. Not only would it be all but impossible for most of them, it isn’t necessary to shift their positions on issues. Instead, they react with displays of attitude, amping up their pose of confrontation with Barack Obama. You say you’ll shoot Obamacare with a gun? I’ll fry it with a blowtorch! And it turns out that that kind of posturing can be enough to stave off the challenge.

I'm sure there are a thousand equally obsolete columns.

Poor Hillary! She thought she picked a boring week.

The week of June 9th. Nothing was supposed to happen. All eyes were to have been on her, as she grandly rolled out her tome and swanned from one graciously conducted interview to the next. She would be queen of the week's news cycle.

And suddenly, people are rubbernecking at Eric Cantor's calamity and getting to know some new guy, some ridiculous professor, maybe even reading his book, a book impertinent enough to contain ideas!

My book, my book, my book, people. It's my week! Meeeee! I was your Secretary of State and I am contemplating offering myself to be your President!

And now, barging into the the week's news cycle, it's Iraq, going to hell!

Insurgents inspired by al-Qaeda rapidly pressed toward Baghdad on Wednesday, confronting little resistance from Iraq’s collapsing security forces and expanding an arc of control that now includes a wide swath of the country.

By nightfall, the militants had reached the flash-point city of Samarra, just 70 miles outside Baghdad, after having first seized Tikrit, Saddam Hussein’s home town, and other cities while pressing southward from Mosul.

The stunning speed with which the rout has unfolded in northern Iraq has raised deep doubts about the capacity of U.S.-trained Iraqi security forces, and it has also kindled fears about the government’s grip on the capital.

And here's Hillary, who thought it would her week, when everyone would look at her, as she revealed her carefully crafted stories of her time making "Hard Choices" as Secretary of State. And now the questions in these book-tour interviews — these interviews that she pictured elevating her into the grandly wise pre-President — are going to have to grill her about what is happening right now in Iraq.

What hard choice would you have made the other way if you'd foreseen this was going to happen in Iraq? Why did you not foresee that this would happen in Iraq? Do you see an element of misogyny in the selection of this week — the week of the launch of "Hard Choices" — for al Qaeda to go on its a rampage in Iraq?

Tooling along, the GOP car was making good time, headed for its destination: Victory in November.

DRIVER: Hey! What happened? Did we get off the 2014 Interstate? Was there an off-ramp back there? What does the polling app say? Is it re-routing? But the polling app didn't warn us before the road got weird looking. I don't trust this app to re-route. We could get even farther afield.

PASSENGER: If we're off the Interstate, we'd better stop and ask for directions. Look, there are lots of people around who seem like they might be helpful.

DRIVER: What, just stop and ask somebody?! We're driving the GOP car, and you want some guy by the side of the road to give us directions to Victory in November?

PASSENGER: Well, clearly we are lost. MAN BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD looks like he's concerned about our predicament, looks like he knows the routes around the Political Landscape...

As the GOP car scoots to a stop, MAN BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD scrambles up, smiling, as if he's delighted at the opportunity to help.

How the Democratic Party is leveraging Eric Cantor's loss: "This guy isn't extreme enough for the GOP... the Tea Party is now in charge."

That arrived in the email a couple hours ago, from the Democratic Party. At the linked website, the line is: "Tea Party Republicans have taken over the GOP — and they'll stop at nothing to win complete control of Congress. You don't want to imagine what a Congress run entirely by the Tea Party would look like."

Do you want to ask how Cantor went wrong or do you want to listen to the Professor?

There's a lot of post-mortem on Cantor, and I assume his crushing loss was about him, and Professor Brat was not so much a specific person as he was Not Cantor, but I'll leave that to others right now, because I want to hear from the Professor.

There's a blog post at the Wall Street Journal by Reid J. Epstein titled "David Brat’s Writings: Hitler’s Rise 'Could All Happen Again,'" that begins ominously:

David Brat, the Virginia Republican who shocked House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R., Va.) Tuesday, wrote in 2011 that Hitler’s rise “could all happen again, quite easily.”

Mr. Brat’s remarks, in a 2011 issue of Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology, came three years before he defeated the only Jewish Republican in Congress.

One might read that and feel that it means that Brat is a fan of Hilter's and that anti-Semitism made him run against Cantor. But that's not what Professor Brat says at all. In fact, Brat is making a brilliant libertarian point about the importance of not off-loading morality to government:

"God acted through people on my behalf... It’s an unbelievable miracle."

Said Dave Brat.

Eric Cantor loses primary to a Tea Partier!

Whoa!!

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor was defeated Tuesday by a little-known economics professor in Virginia's Republican primary, a stunning upset and major victory for the tea party.

Cantor is the second-most powerful member of the U.S. House and was seen by some as a possible successor to the House speaker.

His loss to Dave Brat, a political novice with little money marks a huge victory for the tea party movement, which supported Cantor just a few years ago.

Love the name, btw, Dave Brat....

"Still, Cruz and Christie possess a key similarity: an abundance of old-school manliness."

"Sure, one is a twangy Texan with that shit-kicking, boot-wearing thing going on (despite being a double-ivied, cosmopolitan kind of guy). The other is a Jersey bruiser, with a (much-discussed) physique reminiscent of Tony Soprano after a doughnut bender. But both are delivering a booster shot of testosterone to the GOP in a way few have managed to pull off of late...."

Writes Michelle Cottle in The Daily Beast (erasing Cruz's Hispanicity and Christie's stomach surgery).

Despite the centrality of this image to the GOP, however, precious few of its high-profile players now are apt salesmen for the manly brand....

As for the current team ... Mitt Romney: too much of a doofus. Paul Ryan: ditto, despite the washboard abs. Eric Cantor: too twitchy (manly men do not visibly vibrate with nervous energy). Marco Rubio: too boyish. Jeb Bush: too soft and measured. With his retro Mad Men groove, John Boehner has the potential to be a Don Draper kind of manly man, but he’s too darn weepy.

ADDED: I looked up "shit-kicking" in the (unlinkable) Oxford English Dictionary. It means, "In early use: worthless, contemptible. Later: designating or characteristic of an unsophisticated person from a rural area; (also) tough, belligerent; cf."

1953   J. Harvey Salt in our Wounds vi. 87   You low-life..shit-kicking..useless bastard.
1972   J. Thomson in J. Malley & H. Tokay Contemporaries 189   A beer drinkin finger poppin shit kickin red neck.
1978   Jrnl. Folklore Inst. 15 264   Shit-kicking villagers wearing whatever it is that villagers actually wear these days.
1987   W. Styron Tidewater Morning in Esquire Aug. 88/2,   I, a shit-kicking Carolina yokel who, when I first met you, suspected you of being a neo-abolitionist.
1992   Playboy Nov. 111/1   He told me not to worry, in that shit-kicking drawl of his.
1998   Esquire May 42/1   This woman is one hot, shit-kicking feminist babe.
2002   L. Coady Strange Heaven i. 6   A pack of g.d. shit-kicking yahoos.

How does that relate in any way to Cruz?

Is Eric Cantor making a conscious attempt to talk like Barack Obama?

It really struck me today on "Meet the Press," and when I commented on it, Meade said he'd already been thinking that. I know the exact point in the transcript when the realization occurred to me. David Gregory was questioning Cantor about whether the GOP needs something more than "re-branding": "Isn't it some of the central beliefs in the Republican Party that have hurt it with the electorate?"

Cantor said (transcript, video):

Anticipating disruption from Occupy Philadelphia, Eric Cantor cancels his speech on income equality at the University of Pennsylvania.

The Daily Pennsylvanian reports that a sophomore said, "Yeah, it’s definitely really ironic." And an English professor said, "I think it’s a shame that a speech at a university should not occur because of some fear that there will be skeptics and critics in the audience."

The word "audience" refers to people listening. Didn't these protesters intend to chant or shout or otherwise wreck the speech? If a university arranges a speaking event for someone who is invited as an honored guest and the event transmogrifies into one in which he will serve as a platform for other people who want to yell out their ideas, then the university should expect him to decline to participate in what has become an alternate event of a sort that he would never have accepted if it had been the original invitation. To portray the erstwhile honored guest as fearful of critics and skeptics is demagoguery.

You can read the speech Cantor would have given here. Excerpt:

There are politicians and others who want to demonize people that have earned success in certain sectors of our society....

Instead of talking about a fair share or spending time trying to push those at the top down, elected leaders in Washington should be trying to ensure that everyone has a fair shot and the opportunity to earn success up the ladder. The goal shouldn’t be for everyone to meet in the middle of the ladder....

We must ensure that those who abuse the rules are punished. We must ensure that the solution to wealth disparity is wealth mobility. We must give everyone the chance to move up. Stability plus mobility equals agility. In an agile economy and an agile society, people are climbing and succeeding.

"I think, frankly, he’s in over his head as to what to do about this economy."

Cantor on Obama.

“Cantor didn’t say a word the whole meeting.”

Today at the debt talks.

"Don’t call my bluff."

It's what Obama said when he stormed out of the debt-talks yesterday. Let's analyze it. Glenn Reynolds says:

UM, ISN’T THIS A CASE OF CALLING YOUR OWN BLUFF?... I mean, I’m not a big poker player, but I thought the point of a bluff is not to admit it’s a bluff . . . .

UPDATE: “I’d love to play poker with him. Does he know that it’s played with cards?”

I'd say the biggest problem with the poker metaphor is that it characterizes the talks as a game... and, more particularly, a game in which, on any given hand, somebody wins the whole pot. At the point in poker where you make a comment like "Don’t call my bluff," you are trying to lure the other player into making the wrong decision so you can win it all. In the ultra-serious debt negotiations, where supposedly the 2 sides are engaging in give and take to reach a consensus for the sake of the people, it's bad to reveal that you see it as a game and you're trying to win it... for yourself.

Now, there's also the question whether someone who plays poker competently would use the phrase "Don’t call my bluff." Glenn is right that you don't want the other player to know when you are bluffing, but saying "Don’t call my bluff" isn't admitting you're bluffing. Indeed, if you were playing with someone who thought it was, saying "Don’t call my bluff" would be a great way to get them not to fold when you have an excellent hand. You could just as well say the opposite — "Call my bluff" — in the same situation for the same reason. The other player has the same problem he has when you don't say anything at all — when you keep a poker face: He doesn't know what you have.

Think about when someone outside of a poker game might use the phrase "Don’t call my bluff." Meade and I were talking about that and he said: It's something a father would say. "Son, don't call my bluff." In other words: Do you think I'm kidding? Try me. Within some father-son relationships, that's a very powerful move. The father is demanding obedience, and the son is afraid of what will happen if he does not accede to his father's demands. The father isn't saying what the consequence will be, but the fear of the father's power is enough to make the son comply. He can't risk finding out. It's a test of parental authority.

And we know Obama would like us to see him in that fatherly role. He would like to have our compliance because he knows best. Eat your peas.

The cool one lost his cool.

"President Barack Obama abruptly walked out of a stormy debt-limit meeting with congressional leaders Wednesday, a dramatic setback to the already shaky negotiations. 'He shoved back and said "I’ll see you tomorrow" and walked out,' House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) told reporters in the Capitol after the meeting."

"Cantor and Kyl just threw Boehner and McConnell under the bus."

"This move is an admission that there will be a need for revenues and Cantor and Kyl don't want to be the ones to make that deal."

So says "a senior Democratic aide" after House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl dropped out of the debt talks today, leaving no Republicans in the group.