The Rich Have To Much Power In Our Elections

 

From Robert Reich.

Harris Is Out-Spending Trump And Has A Bigger Campaign - Will It Matter?

 

Harris' Campaign Focus Is Different Than Biden's

 

From The Washington Post.

Be Prepared For A Very Dirty Trump Campaign

 

Robert Reich is warning that Trump and his MAGA cohorts will wage a very dirty campaign:

We can’t allow our good feelings to drift into complacency. 

Trump and his enablers will throw whatever they can at her. Even though nothing has seemed to stick so far, we must be ready for the possibility that something will.

 

Four reasons to expect trouble ahead: 

First, the mainstream media can’t abide a love fest for long. They have to sell advertising and eyeballs, so they’ll soon turn contrarian — reporting Republican-generated opposition research about Harris. (I’m reminded of the old journalism saw that there are only two media stories — “oh, the wonder of it” and “oh, the shame of it” — and one always follows the other.)

We must be ready to respond to those charges with facts — in letters to editors, interviews with local media, public statements from groups we’re associated with, and grassroots organizing. 

Second, Trump is getting desperate — and he is capable of almost anything. He knows the upcoming election is likely to mean the difference between going to jail and going scot-free — so he will pull out all the stops, including racism and misogyny. 

Expect even more bigotry and lies to from him and his enablers. The cesspool will likely turn even more fetid. Sadly, enough Americans are openly or tacitly racist and misogynistic to make this a powerful ploy.

 

What should we do? Call out racism and misogyny, however and wherever it appears. Shame those who perpetuate bigotry. Mobilize others to call it out, too.

 

Third, the billionaires are starting to mobilize against her.

 

To take one example, Elon Musk — the richest man in the world, who has 192 million followers on X (largely because he owns the platform and can maximize his reach on it) — has started a PAC that collects highly detailed personal information. Musk’s goal is to target voters in key battleground states with tailored digital ads favoring Trump and harming Harris.

 

In addition, X’s AI chatbot has told millions of users — falsely — that Kamala Harris is not eligible to appear on their state’s 2024 presidential ballot.

What can you do? At the least, make it expensive for Musk to use his wealth and ownership of X this way. Boycott Tesla, urge your friends to do the same, and tell advertisers to get off the X platform. 

Fourth, most House Republicans are election deniers. Speaker Mike Johnson was one the ringleaders in 2020. If Kamala wins, House Republicans could have enough votes to try to force the presidential election into the House, via the 12th Amendment, where Republicans are likely to have a majority. 

We must demand that the media ask any and all Republican members of Congress being interviewed if they will accept the results of the election and will certify the results from the Electoral College — and if not, explain why not. 

I don’t want to diminish the positive energy we’re enjoying now. I just want us to be realistic about what could, and almost certainly will, come next — and be prepared.

 

Practice nauseous optimism — hoping for the best but knowing in the pit of your stomach that the road ahead will be difficult.

 

And resolve that — despite the sickening techniques Trump will use against her — we will do everything in our lawful power to make Kamala Harris the next president of the United States.

Trump's Campaign Is A Continuation Of His Coup Attempt

 The following is part of an op-ed by Robert Reich:

Trump’s entire presidential campaign constitutes an assault on America. In reality, Trump’s campaign is an ongoing attempted coup. 

In his presidential campaign, he has: 

(1) Repeatedly rejected the legitimate outcome of the 2020 presidential election, without any basis in fact. Trump continues to tell his followers, — in advertisements, on social media, and and in rallies — that the 2020 election was “stolen” from him.

 

This ongoing lie continues to undermine faith in our democracy, divide the public, and invite more violence. 

(2) Repeatedly praised the criminals convicted of the January 6 mob violence. He calls them “hostages” and promises to pardon them, despite the fact that most were convicted of injuring police officers during the attack.

This constitutes an incitement to even more violence on behalf of Trump — encouraging die-hard supporters to repeat events like those that unfolded on Jan. 6.

(3) Repeatedly claimed, without evidence, that the criminal indictments issued against him in connection with his attempts to overturn the election are the work of President Biden, and that prosecutors and judges are part of the same Biden-led conspiracy against him. 

This outright lie is undermining confidence in our system of justice.

In fact, the prosecutors and grand juries who issued the indictments acted independently. The judges handling these cases are doing their best to uphold the Constitution and maintain the principle that no individual is above the law. 

Despite the gag order in this case — barring Trump from attacking witnesses, prosecutors, jurors and the judge’s family — Trump has not ceased doing so. He has reposted articles about the judge’s daughter, a Democratic political consultant, and, this past weekend, assailed one of the prosecution’s key witnesses, Michael D. Cohen, his former fixer. 

Together, these three central elements of Trump’s presidential campaign — his baseless claim that the 2020 election was stolen from him, his praise for the January 6 rioters, and his groundless claim that the indictments against are a partisan plot — constitute a direct extension of his attempted coup that began in 2020.

If we are serious about upholding democracy and the rule of law, shouldn’t Trump’s indictments for seeking to overturn the 2020 election be amended to include his treasonous presidential campaign?

What You Can Do To Save Democracy In The Next 14 Months

 The following post is by former Labor Secretary Robert Reich:

The week after Labor Day weekend usually signals the start of a return to serious business — summer vacations over and kids back to school, fiscal years ending and new ones beginning, cleaning up and battening down for winter. 

This particular week after Labor Day also marks the start of a terrifyingly high-stakes ride for America — five months until the beginning of the primaries, eight until Trump’s trial for seeking to overturn the 2020 election, 10 until the Republican convention in which Trump is almost certain to be nominated, 14 until the presidential election of 2024.

 

All the while, Trump and House Republicans will be throwing up every conceivable distraction and roadblock — threatening to or actually closing the government, impeaching Joe Biden, and holding more hearings on “woke” capitalism, Hunter Biden, the alleged “weaponization” of the Justice Department and the FBI. 

At this point, the polls are too close for comfort. 

The question we must all ask ourselves, I believe, is what can we do between now and the election to help save American democracy? Let me try out a few answers:

— Do everything within your power to ensure that Donald Trump is not reelected president. For some of us, this will mean taking time out of our normal lives to become more directly politically involved — up to and including moving to a critical swing state. 

— Do not succumb to the tempting anesthesias of complacency or cynicism. The stakes are too high. Even if you cannot take much time out of your normal life for direct politics, you will need to organize, mobilize, and energize your friends, colleagues, and neighbors. 

— Counter lies with truth. When you hear someone repeating a Trump Republican lie, correct it. Which will require that you prepare yourself with facts, logic, analysis, and sources.

 

— Do not tolerate bigotry and hate. Call it out. Stand up to it. Denounce it. Demand that others denounce it, too. 

— Do not resort to violence, name-calling, bullying, or any of the other tactics that Trump followers may be using. 

— Be compassionate toward hardcore followers of Trump, but be firm in your opposition. Understand why someone may decide to support Trump, but don’t waste your time and energy trying to convert them. Use your time and energy on those who still have open minds. 

— Don’t waste your time and energy commiserating with people who already agree with you. Don’t gripe, whine, wring your hands, and kvetch with other progressives about how awful Trump and his Republican enablers are. Don’t snivel over or criticize Biden and the Democrats for failing to communicate more effectively how bad Trump and his Republican enablers are. None of this will get you anything except an upset stomach or worse. 

— Demonstrate, but don’t mistake demonstrating for political action. You may find it gratifying to stand on a corner in Berkeley with a sign asking drivers to “honk if you hate fascism” and elicit lots of honks, but that’s as politically effectual as taking a warm shower. Organize people who don’t normally vote to vote for Biden. Mobilize get-out-the-vote efforts in your community. Get young people involved. 

— Don’t get deflected by the latest sensationalist post or story by or about Trump. Don’t let the media’s short-term attention span divert your eyes from the prize — the survival of American democracy during one of the greatest stress tests it has had to endure, organized by one of the worst demagogues in American history. 

I cannot overstate how critical the outcome of the next 14 months will be to everything we believe in. And the importance of your participation.

Most Approve Of Indictments & Want An End To Campaign

 

The charts above reflect the results of the new CNN / SSRS Poll -- done between June 13th and 17th of a nationwide sample of 1,350 adults, with a 3.4 point margin of error.

Biden Hits Campaign Trail As A Truman-Like Fighter

President Biden has hit the campaign trail, and it's looking like he's ready to fight for Democrats to hold Congress. I like the way he's started.

Here is how Jennifer Rubin describes it in The Washington Post:

After a year of rambling President Biden, muted Joe Biden, unconvincing-bipartisan-cheerleader Joe Biden, on Thursday we got feisty Joe Biden, pugnacious Joe Biden and MAGA-condemning Joe Biden in a speech in Rockville, Md., marking his start to midterm campaigning. For all the hand-wringing about his negative polling (which seems to be improving) and his drag on Democratic candidates, Biden reminded us how he got elected in 2020. When he gets his dander up, he can be an effective campaigner.

Biden seemed to channel Harry S. Truman, who, to a voter shouting “Give ’em hell, Harry!” declared, “I don’t give them hell. I just tell the truth about them, and they think it’s hell.” And did Biden ever give it to the MAGA radicals.

“In 2020, you and 81 million Americans voted to save our democracy,” he reminded the crowd. “That’s why Donald Trump isn’t just a former president. He is a defeated former president.” As for the midterms, Biden declared, “Your right to choose is on the ballot this year. The Social Security you paid for from the time you had a job is on the ballot. The safety of your kids from gun violence is on the ballot, and it’s not hyperbole, the very survival of our planet is on the ballot.” He added, “Your right to vote is on the ballot. Even the democracy. Are you ready to fight for these things now?”

Biden reveled in recalling how Democrats took on Big Pharma, Big Oil and National Rifle Association. But his strongest words came in a blunt assault on the MAGA movement, something Democrats and other democracy defenders have been pining to hear.

“The MAGA Republicans don’t just threaten our personal rights and economic security,” Biden said. “They’re a threat to our very democracy. They refuse to accept the will of the people. They embrace — embrace — political violence. They don’t believe in democracy.” He continued, “This is why, in this moment, those of you who love this country — Democrats, independents, mainstream Republicans — we must be stronger.”

His harshest language came earlier at a separate fundraiser, where he told donors, “What we’re seeing now is either the beginning or the death knell of an extreme MAGA philosophy.” He continued, “It’s not just Trump, it’s the entire philosophy that underpins the — I’m going to say something — it’s like semi-fascism.”

No one should be shocked by the president calling the movement — one that tried to overthrow a democratic election, continues to threaten violence, spews the racist Great Replacement theory, operates in a universe of delusion and disinformation and seeks to redefine America as a White Christian nation — semi-fascist. (Pro-fascist or just fascistwould have worked as well.)

A party that celebrates Hungary’s illiberal Viktor Orban, embraces Russian propaganda and grovels before Turkish strongman Recep Tayyip Erdogan cannot complain when it is held accountable for its right-wing nationalism and authoritarian hero-worship.

Biden seemed both to be energized by his wins on gun safety, prescription drug prices, climate change, veterans’ health care (the Pact Act) and the Chips and Science Act but also freed from the necessity (in his own mind) to pull punches for the sake of getting GOP lawmakers to buy into his agenda.

No more talk that “Biden was elected to lower the temperature.” No more blather that “voters want to stop the partisan fighting.” After ceding rhetorical ground to an unhinged opponent never interested in “unity,” Biden has decided to tell the truth — and let the GOP think it’s hell.

Democrats and weak-kneed pundits need not fret about Biden free-ranging on the campaign trail. As vice president and then as presidential candidate in 2020, he was at his best when fighting against special interests and their right-wing pets. Republicans have to date paid little price for opposing a minimum tax on big corporations that pay nothing, opposing middle-class relief from high health-care and energy costs and, most of all, opposing widely held views on contraception, a woman’s right to choose, free speech and LGBTQ equality.

Biden’s message now is simple: Republicans’ free ride is over. Let’s call them out for what they are. That Joe Biden is the one who could recapture the hearts of Democrats as he considers a second term. Certainly, helping Democrats pull off an expectations-defying midterm election could help as well.

Jan. 6th Riot Was Organized/Funded By Trump Campaign

The Trump campaign would like you to believe that the January 6th demonstrations that turned into an insurrectionist riot was organized and funded by grassroots Trump supporters. That is simply not true.

The truth is that a Trump campaign official in charge of collecting donations (Caroline Wren) had a big part in organizing the insurrection. And a huge Trump campaign donor (Julie Jenkins Fancelli) provided the money for it.

I'm sure that Trump and his campaign aides will try to claim that this was done without his knowledge. That's ridiculous! If there's one thing we've learned about Trump, it's that he's a micro-manager. NOTHING happens in his organizations, both business and political, without his knowledge and consent,

The truth is that Trump didn't just incite the insurrection -- he organized it!

Here is part of the coverage of this story from ProPublica.org:

In the week leading up to the Jan. 6 rally in Washington, D.C., that exploded into an attack on the Capitol, a top Trump campaign fundraiser issued a directive to a woman who had been overseeing planning for the event. 

“Get the budget and vendors breakdown to me and Justin,” Caroline Wren wrote to Cindy Chafian, a self-described “constitutional conservative,” in a Dec. 28 text message obtained by ProPublica.

Wren was no ordinary event planner. She served as a deputy to Donald Trump Jr.’s girlfriend, Kimberly Guilfoyle, at Trump Victory, a joint presidential fundraising committee during the 2020 campaign. The Justin mentioned in her text was Justin Caporale, a former top aide to first lady Melania Trump, whose production company helped put on the event at the Ellipse.

Text messages and an event-planning memo obtained by ProPublica, along with an interview with Chafian, indicate that Wren, a Washington insider with a low public profile, played an extensive role in managing operations for the event. The records show that Wren oversaw logistics, budgeting, funding and messaging for the Jan. 6 rally that featured President Donald Trump.

Chafian told ProPublica that Wren and others had pushed her aside as plans intensified, including as a late effort was made to get Trump to speak at the event.

On Dec. 29, after receiving the budget, Wren instructed Chafian, via text, to hold off on printing event-related slogans “until we decide what the messaging is and we have no clue on timing because it all depends on the votes that day so we won’t know timing for a few more days.” The “timing” appears to be a reference to Congress’ Jan. 6 vote to certify the election results.

Wren’s services were enlisted by a major donor to Trump’s presidential campaign, according to The Wall Street Journal, which reported Saturday that Julie Jenkins Fancelli, the heiress to Publix Super Markets, committed some $300,000 to fund the Jan. 6 rally.

The funding commitment by Fancelli, who Federal Election Commission records show has donated more than $1 million to Trump Victory, the president’s campaign and the Republican National Committee since 2018, was facilitated by the right-wing conspiracy peddler Alex Jones, the Journal reported. Chafian told ProPublica that she herself had been directed by Jones to Wren, who, she was told, had ties to a wealthy donor who wanted to support the January affair.

Trump's Rallies Did Not Help Him As Much As He Hoped

Trump's big plan for his campaign was to hold rallies. He expected those rallies, where thousands of people showed up, to excite his base and increase his vote. It didn't work that way. He held campaign rallies in 30 counties, and in most of those counties he underperformed what he had done in 2016.

Here's how NBC News reports it:

As the 2020 campaign wound down, President Donald Trump held rallies across the country to fire up his supporters and get them out to vote. Many saw the rallies as a sign of big enthusiasm for Trump, but the data suggest the visits did not produce the desired impact for the president.

Comparing Trump campaign stops over the last two weeks of the race to election results shows that in the overwhelming majority of cases, Trump underperformed his 2016 margins in the counties he visited, in some cases by large amounts.

There were 30 Trump campaign stops in that period, according to an NBC News tally, in states from Arizona to Nebraska to Pennsylvania. In five counties that Trump visited he saw better results than he did in 2016, but in the remaining 25 his margins of victory got smaller, his margin of defeat grew or the county flipped Democratic.

The numbers are important to note because they raise questions about how journalists and analysts perceive campaigns.

Crowd sizes are often held out as a way to gauge support for a politician, and sometimes they are. But during a pandemic, with a polarizing candidate on the stump, it’s possible the meaning of the rallies were misread. While the crowds were visible sign of enthusiasm for Trump, there were much bigger, and less visible, groups of people who were not at the rallies and who may have seen them in a negative light.

A look at some crucial states that were the sites of several rallies offers some evidence for an invisible, negative impact for the president.

His Campaign Has Cash problems & Trump Is NOT Donating

The Trump campaign has a cash problem. Most interesting is that Trump, who said he could self-fund his campaign, has only given a paltry $8000 to the campaign.

Does he expect to lose, and not want to waste his own money on a losing effort?

Here's how NBCnews.com describes Trump's problem:

“Trump’s campaign has $10.1 million booked on television and radio ads between Wednesday and Election Day, compared to Biden’s $50 million.”

“The president can still count on a big assist from the RNC, which is spending another $12.6 million in key swing states like Florida, as well as from outside groups set to spend tens of millions more.”

“But when all aligned outside groups are combined with the campaign’s future spending, Democrats are set to outspend Republicans $109.8 million to $40.7 million on the presidential ad airwaves in the closing days. That’s nearly a 3-to-1 advantage, and it tells you everything you need to know how the political winds are blowing in these final days.”

Barack Obama's Philadelphia Speech

 

Barack Obama hit the campaign trail for Joe Biden this week. On Wednesday, he delivered a great speech in Philadelphia. The whole speech is well worth reading or watching, but here is some of it:

I never thought Donald Trump would embrace my vision or continue my policies but I did hope for the sake of the country that he might show some interest in taking the job seriously, but it hasn't happened. He hasn't shown any interest in doing the work or helping anybody but himself and his friends or treating the presidency like a reality show that he can use to get attention. And by the way, even then his TV ratings are down. So you know that upsets him.

But the thing is, this is not a reality show, this is reality. And the rest of us have had to live with the consequences of him proving himself incapable of taking the job seriously. At least 220,000 Americans have died. More than 100,000 small businesses have closed. Millions of jobs are gone. Our proud reputation around the world is in tatters. Presidents up for reelection usually ask if the country is better off than it was four years ago. I'll tell you one thing, four years ago you'd be tailgating here at the Lincoln instead of watching a speech from your cars. The only people truly better off than they were four years ago are the billionaires who got his tax cuts. Right now as we speak, Trump won't even extend relief to the millions of families who are having trouble paying the rent or putting food on the table because of this pandemic. But he's been doing all right by himself. . . .

I want to be honest here. This pandemic would have been challenging for any president but this idea that somehow this White House has done anything but completely screw this up. It's just not true. I'll give you a very specific example. Korea identified it's first case at the same time that the United States did. At the same time, their per capita death toll is just 1.3% of what ours is. In Canada, it's just 39% of what ours is. Other countries are still struggling with the pandemic but they're not doing as bad as we are because they've got a government that's actually been paying attention.

And that means lives lost. And that means an economy that doesn't work. And just yesterday, when asked if he'd do anything differently, Trump said, "Not much." Really? Not much? Nothing you can think of that could have helped some people keep their loved ones alive? So, Joe's not going to screw up testing. He's not going to call scientists idiots. He's not going to host a super spreader event at the White House. Joe will get this pandemic under control with a plan to make testing free and widely available, to get a vaccine to every American cost free and to make sure our frontline heroes never ask other countries for their equipment they need.

His plan will guarantee paid sick leave for workers and parents affected by the pandemic and make sure that the small businesses that hold our communities together and employ millions of Americans can reopen safely. Donald Trump likes to claim he built this economy but America created 1.5 million more jobs in the last three years of the Obama-Biden administration than in the first three years of the Trump-Pence administration. How you figure that? And that was before he could blame the pandemic. Now, he did inherit the longest streak of job growth in American history but just like everything else he inherited, he messed it up. The economic damage he inflicted by botching the pandemic response means he will be the first president since Herbert Hoover to actually lose jobs. Joe's got a plan to create 10 million good clean energy jobs as part of a historic $2 trillion investment to fight climate change, to secure environmental justice. And he'll pay for it by rolling back that tax cut for billionaires. And Joe sees this moment not just as a chance to get back to where we were but to finally make long overdue changes so that our economy actually makes life a little easier for everybody, the waitress trying to raise her kid on her own, the student trying to figure out how to pay for next semester's classes, the shift worker who's always on the edge of getting laid off, the cancer survivor who's worried about her preexisting conditions, protections being taken away. . . .

We're not going to have a president that goes out of his way to insult anybody who doesn't support him or threaten them with jail. That's not normal presidential behavior.

That's not normal presidential behavior. We wouldn't tolerate it from a high school principal. We wouldn't tolerate it from a coach. We wouldn't tolerate it from a co-worker. We wouldn't tolerate it in our family, except for maybe crazy uncle somewhere. I mean, why would we expect and accept this from the President of the United States? And why are folks making excuses for that? "Oh, well, that's just him." No. There are consequences to these actions. They embolden other people to be cruel and divisive and racist, and it frays the fabric of our society, and it affects how our children see things. And it affects the ways that our families get along. It affects how the world looks at America. That behavior matters. Character matters. And by the way, while he's doing all that, it distracts all of us from the truly destructive actions that his appointees are doing all across the government, actions that affect your lives. The Environmental Protection Agency that's supposed to protect our air and our water is right now run by an energy lobbyist that gives polluters free reign to dump unlimited poison into our air and water. The Labor Department that's supposed to protect workers and their rights, right now it's run by a corporate lobbyist who's declared war on workers, guts protections to keep essential folks safe during a pandemic, makes it easier for big corporations to shortchange them on their wages. The Interior Department, that's supposed to protect our public lands and wild spaces, our wildlife and our wilderness. And right now that's run by an oil lobbyist who's determined to sell them to the highest bidder.

You've got the Education Department that's supposed to give every kid a chance, and that's run by a billionaire who guts rules designed to protect students from getting ripped off by for profit colleges and stiffs arm students looking for loan relief in the middle of an economic collapse. I mean, the person who runs Medicaid right now is doing their best to kick people off of Medicaid instead of sign them up for Medicaid. Come on. When Joe and Kamala are in charge, they're not going to surround themselves with hacks and lobbyists, but they're going to appoint qualified public servants who actually care about looking out for you, for your job, for your family, for your health, for your security, for your planet, and that more than anything is what separates them from their opponents. They actually care about every American, including the ones that don't agree with them.

And they're going to fight for you every day. They care about you and they care about this democracy. They believe in a democracy. . . .

A president by himself can't solve every challenge in a global economy. But if we've got Joe Biden and Kamala Harris in the White House at a House and Senate that are focused on working people, it can make a difference and get millions of people the help they need. A president by himself can't eliminate all racial bias in our criminal justice system. But if we've got district attorneys and state's attorneys and sheriffs and police chiefs focused on equality and justice, it can make things better. . . .

And the fact that we don't get 100% of what we want right away is not a good reason not to vote. It means we've got to vote and then get some change and then vote some more and then get some more change, and then keep on voting until we get it right. . . .

I'm asking you to remember what this country can be. What it's like when we treat each other with respect and dignity, what it's like when our elected officials actually behave responsibly. I'm asking you to believe in Joe's ability, in Kamala's ability to lead this country out of these dark times, and help us build it back better, because we can't abandon those who are hurting right now. We can't abandon the children who aren't getting the education they need right now.

We can't abandon those protesters who inspired us. We've got to channel their activism into action, we can't just imagine a better future. We've got to fight for it. We've got to out hustle the other side, we got to outwork the other side, we've got to vote like never before and leave no doubt. . . .

What Lincoln called the better angels of our nature, those are still in us. We see them operating every single day. We see them in neighborhoods, we see them in churches and synagogues and mosques and temples. We see them in people helping out a neighbor. We see them them inside our own families. We see that what is best in us is still there, but we've got to give it voice, and we've got to do it now.