"Angry Trump Accidentally Blurts Out Unnerving New Plot to Rig Midterms/Donald Trump just gave away his own game."

That's a headline at The New Republic that made me click, and I know I shouldn't reward TNR for its unnerving new plot to rig the attention market, but let's try to understand what "Angry Trump" supposedly has in mind.

I read this article so you don't have to. You already know the context, Trump's Truth Social Post about mail-in voting, which we talked about yesterday, here.

The TNR author, Greg Sargent, is calling attention to the fact that Trump mentioned the 2026 midterms. Trump said he'd sign an executive order "to help bring HONESTY to the 2026 Midterm Elections." That's it. That's how "Donald Trump just gave away his own game." He revealed that he saw a causal relationship between his proposed reforms and the coming elections. Of course, Trump doesn't say he wants to rig the midterms for the Republicans. He's claiming to un-rig the elections, and he says "Democrats are virtually Unelectable without using this completely disproven Mail-In SCAM."

Now one might try to say that the elections are not currently rigged. Here's Sargent:

There is overwhelming evidence that any fraud in mail balloting is limited to nonexistent. Indeed, it’s now beyond obvious that the pretext is the thing to watch.

I love when the author says something is "beyond obvious" and I can't even understand what he's talking about, but let's read on: 

"Undeniably, the public has soured on President Biden’s handling of [illegal immigration]."

"Voters trust Trump on it by wide margins, support making asylum harder and even back his border wall. This has pundits opining that the issue now favors Trump. But let’s be clear on why this is happening and what it really means for 2024. Recall that Trump’s handling of immigration was also deeply unpopular. In April 2019, another time when migrant arrivals dominated the news, large majorities opposed Trump’s approach, and very small minorities supported a border wall and wanted to make it harder to apply for asylum.... While the mere promise of a better-managed border would be a formidable argument against Biden, Trump... seem[s] determined to telegraph unbridled nativist savagery, which could well constitute political overreach in 2024...."

I'm trying to read the Greg Sargent column "Trump’s plan for giant detention camps points to a brutal 2024 reality" (WaPo).

Ah! Let me translate that. Trump can win on the immigration issue, but the way he can lose is if people perceive that his immigration policy is fascist and cruel. Therefore, Trump's antagonists are on notice that they must make the most of whatever evidence they have that Trump's ideas about immigration come from something truly evil. 

For example, just in this column, there's this:

"Donald Trump and his allies are reportedly talking about releasing Mar-a-Lago surveillance footage showing FBI agents searching the Florida resort."

"This will supposedly show jackbooted FBI thugs swarming over the former president’s home, graphically illustrating his long-running complaint of political persecution. Trump absolutely should release that footage. It would totally Own the Libs...."

WaPo's Greg Sargent snarks, in "Trump’s bizarre threat to release Mar-a-Lago footage is revealing."

"The hearings starting Thursday will feature a documentary filmmaker who has new video evidence of the violent mob assault incited by Donald Trump..."

"... and extensive advance planning among paramilitary-type groups. Riveting material about Trump’s corruption and the GOP’s enabling of it will follow. By contrast, Fox hosts are gearing up to substitute a propagandistic alternative story in which the only real victims related to Jan. 6 and the hearings are Trump and his supporters. House Republicans allied with Trump will manufacture material for this disinformation push designed to keep the truth from the base at all costs."

Writes Greg Sargent in "Fox News’s blackout of Jan. 6 points to a hidden crisis for Democrats" (WaPo).

A propagandistic alternative story or an alternative propagandistic story?

"It’s galling that the word 'climate' appears nowhere in Manchin’s piece, even as he piously suggests he has a divinely inspired reading of what America truly 'needs to spend.'"

"This is doubly absurd, given that he sternly lectures us about how this spending will imperil our ability to meet 'future crises.'... Manchin justifies his demand for a 'pause' on spending by citing fears of inflation. But that’s a terrible theoretical pitfall. As economist J.W. Mason told Eric Levitz, a big threat posed by inflated inflation fears is that they could become a justification for efforts to 'scale back our plans for decarbonization.' The irony, as Mason noted, is that volatile fossil fuel prices are themselves introducing 'instability into the economic system,' so inflation actually tells us that 'we need to transition faster away from fossil fuels.' Manchin is learning exactly the wrong message, threatening awful consequences."

From "Joe Manchin’s new threat to destroy Biden’s agenda is worse than it seems" by Greg Sargent (WaPo). Not quoted with approval. 

If he's American, why are you calling him "an Asian man."

You know, it's so dumb to accuse Trump of political crimes like this and to fail to make sure you're not committing the same damned crime you want us to be so outraged about it. The genius here is Greg Sargent at WaPo:

President Trump’s new campaign ad attacking Joe Biden as soft on China and coronavirus is drawing attention for its ugly xenophobia. As many have noted, in order to portray Biden as weak and overly deferential toward China — and, by extension, toward coronavirus — the ad shows Biden bowing to an Asian man with Chinese flags in the background.

The man turns out to be American.

Asian man!! He's American!

I've already talked about that ad — here, in a post that went up at 6:00 a.m. — so I'm not going into any more detail. I just wanted to laugh at Greg Sargent.

"... 98 percent of Fox-citing Republicans oppose impeaching and removing Trump... 90 percent of non-Fox-citing Republicans oppose impeaching and removing him — which is overwhelmingly high..."

"... but suggests that among this group, at least, Trump could suffer losses on the margins as the inquiry turns up worse revelations. And here’s another real doozy: In response to my inquiry, PRRI tells me that 71 percent of Fox-citing Republicans strongly approve of Trump, while only 39 percent of non-Fox-citing Republicans strongly approve of him.... On impeachment, Fox News figures have put out nonstop disinformation. They regularly claim the inquiry is invalid absent a full House vote (which is baseless); that Trump did nothing wrong in the Ukraine scandal (he pressured a foreign leader to help him rig our election by investigating potential opponent Joe Biden); that the whistleblower has been discredited (his complaint perfectly captured what Trump actually did); and that Biden did the same or worse (which is based on a fabricated narrative).... "

From "Want Trump removed? New data shows Fox News is a huge obstacle" by Greg Sargent at WaPo (which is trying to be a huge obstacle to Trump's staying in office).

Here's the top-rated comment: "Fox should be labeled a national security threat, a seditious organization and a Russian asset." I can't tell if that was written as sarcasm or what percent of the up-voters are perceiving it as sarcasm.

"Democrats are badly blowing it against Trump. A brutal new TV ad shows how."

Headline for a Greg Sargent column at WaPo. Here's the video he's talking about:



The ad has ordinary-looking people pissed off and saying things like:

Now you tell us to wait for the next election? Really? Really? Really? This is why we volunteered. Raised money. Went door to door. And voted in the last election. Our founding fathers expected you — Congress — to hold a lawless president accountable. And you’re doing nothing. Nothing. Nothing. He broke his oath of office. He’s defying you. Laughing at you. And he’s getting away with it.

Sargent comments:

Of course, Democrats aren’t doing “nothing.” But there is the risk that if their oversight is neutered and they don’t act, this picture of fecklessness will be the reigning one.

Is there a better way to handle this? Perhaps not. Because, at bottom, the core question is whether it is acceptable for Democrats to refrain from an impeachment inquiry in the face of corruption and misconduct they plainly believe merits one....

Plainly believe? It's not clear what they believe, even if they plainly say an impeachment inquiry is warranted. I think they most likely believe in winning elections. I judge what people really believe based on what they actually do.

I assume the Democrats believe in using the idea of impeachment without actually conducting impeachment proceedings and one reason they stop where they do is that they don't really believe what they are saying, that what Trump did warrants impeachment.

"Don’t tell anybody I told you this: Trump is goading us to impeach him. That’s what he’s doing. Every single day, he’s just like, taunting and taunting and taunting."

Said Nancy Pelosi.

Pelosi argued Trump is daring them to impeach him because he believes it would help him “solidify his base” ahead of his 2020 re-election. Pelosi said that puts Democrats in a dilemma.

“We can’t impeach him for political reasons, and we can’t not impeach him for political reasons,” Pelosi said. “We have to see where the facts take us."

There's also "The nightmare scenario for Democrats on Trump’s corruption" by Greg Sargent (at WaPo). Sargent is recommending impeachment proceedings in order to generate a legitimate purpose for the House to get Trump's tax returns. Without impeachment proceedings, there's a good chance that a court would reject "just rummaging through Trump’s returns to embarrass him and not for a legitimate legislative purpose." And that loss would make Democrats look bad right before the 2020 elections. Sargent says:

This would constitute an epic, disastrous failure. Not getting Trump’s returns would allow him to get away with one of his most blatant acts of contempt for transparency, for the separation of powers and for the notion that basic accountability should apply to him at all.

That's histrionic. If the courts took the position Sargent is afraid of, it would be because the court was enforcing separation of powers, limiting Congress to the legislative role and protecting the Executive power from encroachment. Trump isn't showing "contempt" for separation of powers. He's taking a position on separation of powers. That position would either win or lose in court, and the court would give the final answer on the meaning of separation of powers.

Sargent says that "if Democrats were to initiate an impeachment inquiry, it would create a legislative purpose for compelling release of the returns that is basically unassailable — that legislative purpose being impeachment." Sargent quotes a legal expert who says “I don’t see how any information can be withheld — the Mueller report, tax returns, anything. This would make it airtight.” The expert suggests that even without impeachment, Democrats could just say their legitimate legislative purpose for getting anything they want from Trump is to figure out whether to start impeachment proceedings. It seems to me that any of that would lead to the same resistance from Trump and need to resort to the courts, with the same potential for the "nightmare scenario" outcome for Democrats.

Sargent doesn't say that that Democrats "must launch an inquiry right this second." But they need to put it "on the table clearly as a point toward which they are converging out of necessity" and "more forthrightly engage with the argument that the failure to do this could end up with Democratic oversight mostly being neutered, with no remaining options." So... forthrightly admit that they are cornered?

I think Pelosi is taking another path. She knows they are cornered, and she's not going to admit that. Her idea is to shift attention to Trump: Look, he's trying to make us impeach him! She's trying to get Democrats to adjust to what she knows must happen. There won't be an impeachment. Start thinking that impeachment is what Trump wants.

I guess I'm supposed to stop pretending.

Maybe this is the beginning of the end of Trump derangement syndrome.

Those who are coming to terms with the wrongness of their belief in the Russia collusion may take refuge in the idea that the other side is delusional.

ADDED: One way to deal with the collapse of the big Russia hoax is to switch to all the many things, the "multiple fronts." I only looked at the headline. I just don't believe Greg Sargent's scattershot approach is anything but an attempt to recover from the devastating loss of the fantasy that the President of the United States is in some elaborate, nefarious collusion with Russia.

But I'll read the Sargent piece so you don't have to. The "multiple fronts" on which Trump is "floundering" are: 1. Trump's attempt to make health-care reform a central issue for the GOP, 2. Trump's threat to close the border with Mexico unless Mexico helps with illegal immigration, 3. Oh... I think that's it. Hm. 2 things. I don't think you should say "multiple" unless you've got at least 3.

Sargent concludes: "Trump is floundering around disastrously on multiple fronts. We need to see what’s right at the end of our noses." It is right at the end of our nose, and it stinks, like a rotten flounder.

This WaPo article reads like PR from the Sanders campaign.

"The latest draft of the Democratic Party platform, which is set to be released as early as this afternoon, will show that Bernie Sanders won far more victories on his signature issues than has been previously thought, according to details provided by a senior Sanders adviser... Sanders did far better out of this process thus far than has been previously thought.... To be sure, Sanders will continue to fight for more in coming weeks... And we can’t be certain whether Sanders will endorse Clinton before the convention or if he is unsatisfied with the final platform product. But it looks as if this process is going better for progressives and Bernie supporters than previously suggested. And this perhaps makes it more likely that, in the end, Sanders could end up backing the nominee and helping to unify the party with less discord than expected."

That's from Greg Sargent in WaPo.

So Sanders lost his quest for the nomination, but he sort of winning because he's had "far more victories on his signature issues than has been previously thought," he's done "better out of this process thus far than has been previously thought," and it's going "better than previously suggested... with less discord than expected."

Posit a baseline — some claim of what some unspecified crowd must have been thinking — and you can always claim to actually be doing rather well compared to that. 

"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.

"Liberals who are dreading the scandal-mania that is taking hold should note that it contains a potential upside..."

How many liberal columnists have typed intros like that and then paused, wracking their brains for something to write next?

IN THE COMMENTS: Henry said:

Oh cripes, it's just Greg Sargent reading the entrails for a utilitarian polyp.

I was hoping for something more tangible. Something like "Liberals who are dreading the scandal-mania that is taking hold should note that it contains a potential upside: We could steal our souls back." 

"Is 'God, guns, and gays' losing its peril for Democrats?"

A strange way to phrase a question, in this Greg Sargent column. What does this stunning lack of parallelism reveal about the Mind of Sargent?

Indeed, I’m cautiously hopeful that this time around, Democrats will overcome their typical skittishness on guns. ... [T]he politics of this issue have changed: Democrats are less reliant on conservative, rural, gun-owning voters than at any time in the history of the party, due to Dem gains among socially moderate suburbanites, and ongoing demographic shifts that continue to boost the vote share among minorities and young voters  — all voter groups who may not see “gun rights” as a potent issue.

You know those "rural" folk, who cling to their guns and religion. Maybe they can be ignored by Democrats who have other blocs out of which to build victories. But to throw "gays" on the list... well, that's not something those horrible peasants cling to like guns and religion. It's something they're supposedly repelled by, perhaps something like the way those socially moderate suburbanites are imagined to have an aversion to God and guns.

I guess Sargent might love alliteration. GGG. But someone ought to tell him that — coming from a very conspicuous gay guy — GGG stands for "good, giving, and game":  ("good in bed," "giving equal time and equal pleasure," and "game for anything — within reason'").

And some people think "Guns, God and Government" — the work of a not-quite-earless guy with a lady's name.

What does GGG mean to you? I'm thinking, for me, grammar, graphomania, and...

"The unemployment truthers are not helping Romney."

Says WaPo's Greg Sargent, but I'm a Sargent truther. Sargent skews everything to try to help Obama. Of all the mainstream commentators I've been watching over the last few years, he's the most predictable. In no way do I believe he's sincerely and accurately offering advice to Romney supporters.

"Wisconsin Dems furious with DNC for refusing to invest big money in Walker recall."

Writes Greg Sargent (who, I've observed, leans distinctly liberal):

The failure to put up the money Wisconsin Dems need to execute their recall plan comes at a time when the national Republican Party is sinking big money into defending Walker, raising fears that the DNC’s reluctance could help tip the race his way.

“We are frustrated by the lack of support from the Democratic National Committee and the Democratic Governors Association,” a top Wisconsin Democratic Party official tells me. “Scott Walker has the full support and backing of the Republican Party and all its tentacles. We are not getting similar support.”...

“Scott Walker has made this a national election,” the Wisconsin Dem tells me. “If he wins, he will turn his victory into a national referendum on his ideas about the middle class. It will hurt Democrats nationally. The fact that [national Dems] are sitting on their hands now is so frustrating. The whole ticket stands to lose.”

It suggests that from the inside, the Democrats see Walker winning, and they don't want to spend their money this way. And if they're going to lose, they don't way it to seem as though they viewed this race as a national referendum. They'll want to refute that characterization if the Republicans use it. Denying Tom Barrett the money he needs now builds a foundation for minimizing Walker's win: He grossly outspent us. (By the way, Sargent never mentions the name Tom Barrett.)

Over on Intrade, Scott Walker winning the recall just hit 72.5%.

Russ Feingold says Occupy Wall Street "will make the Tea Party look like ... a tea party."

Interviewed by Greg Sargent:

“The worm is finally turning on the nonsense of blaming the wrong people for what happened in 2008,” said Feingold, whose new group, Progressives United, was formed to counter the Citizens United decision and corporate influence over politics. “The American people are saying, wait, we have the boot of corporations on our necks, and we’re sick of it. This is a significantly coherent message at the beginning of something like this.”

The news media declare a big victory for conservatives... but why? I'm skeptical!

Wall Street Journal: "A Tea Party Triumph: The debt deal is a rare bipartisan victory for the forces of smaller government."

New York Times: "To Escape Chaos, a Terrible Deal" ("a nearly complete capitulation to the hostage-taking demands of Republican extremists").

Washington Post (Greg Sargent): "GOP on verge of huge, unprecedented political victory."

Since the vote has not occurred, I have the uneasy feeling that I'm hearing sales pressure. What a fabulous deal for you! Sign here!

That's not to say lying and spinning become a thing of the past after the deal is closed. It just changes. Before, the effort is to get people to sign on. Those who most want the deal have a motivation to act like it's a big victory for whoever is most resistant — in this case, the Tea Party. Afterwards, everyone tries to find a way to gain — either by claiming they really extracted a lot out of the other side and/or by blaming anything that seems bad now on the terrible concessions their stupid/evil opponents insisted on.

This morning, reading these editorials, I suspect that the mainstream media think the Tea Party members of Congress are crazy — they're out there on the ledge. The idea is to talk them in.

"What did David Plouffe really say about unemployment?"

WaPo's Greg Sargent tries to rehabilitate Plouffe, who clearly did say that the unemployment rate is not going to determine how people vote in 2012.

When you see the transcript and think about it, it's obvious that Plouffe did not say that unemployment wouldn't matter to voters. He said that the percentage itself isn't what affects voters' minds. What matters is their personal subjective experience:

So, you know, people won’t vote based on the unemployment rate. They’re gonna vote based on, “How do I feel about my own situation? Do I believe the president makes decisions based on me and my family?”

Sargent says:

You can argue that it was a misstep in that the quote does sound tone-deaf when reproduced without the surrounding context, and it’s understandable why people would see it as insensitive when viewed without that context.

A lot of clever remarks are like that. A witty, engaging speaker will say something surprising and counterintuitive, but then flesh it out or add one more point, and then it clicks. Of course, if you have opponents, you've got to anticipate what they'll do with the little slice of what you said that seems head-slappingly idiotic. So it may not be so smart to be smart like that.

Now let's look more closely at that possibly clever notion of Plouffe's: Any given voter is going to ask not what the facts are about Americans in general, but how do I feel about what's happening to me personally and do I believe that the President cares about me. 

This is how people* got hooked into voting for Obama in the first place! Plouffe and company massaged people into the place where they had a feeling about Obama. Hope. Change. Yes We Can.

And Plouffe is gearing up to do it again. The difference this time is that Obama is not an outsider to the current conditions. He represents not change, but: the same. And the current situation is dreadful. Plouffe knows that, and his comments show how he's planning, this time, to do the same thing but different. Do I believe the president makes decisions based on me and my family? Yes, you do. Or you will. Plouffe hopes.

You can savage Plouffe all you want for his seemingly stupid remark, but don't miss the opportunity to see what he revealed about the theory of the reelect Obama campaign.
_______________________

*Not me. I voted for Obama, but I coolly observed all this emotionalism, soberly examined the 2 major party candidates, and made a rational choice.

"Wisconsin Dems 6. Wisconsin Republicans 0."

Greg Sargent explains.