2020 Democratic Race Registers Its First Casualty

(Photo of Richard Ojeda is from the West Virginia Press Association.)

The race for the Democratic presidential nomination is expected to be crowded, and indeed, a couple of days ago there were already nine people who had declared their candidacy. But one of the nine has already dropped out of the race -- even though we are still about a year away from the first caucuses and primaries.

West Virginia State Senator Richard Ojeda (pictured) announced that he was running for the Democratic presidential nomination last November. And just about 11 days ago, he resided his senate seat to put all of his efforts into his presidential campaign.

That didn't last long though. Ojeda ran into a wall of reality, and last Friday he dropped out of the race. In a 90 second video, he said:

“When I was a kid in grade school, my teachers always said that anyone could grow up and become president. Unfortunately, what I’m starting to realize is that unless you have wealth, influence and power, it’s not gonna happen.”

He went on to say he couldn't ask people to continue donating "to a campaign that's probably not going to get off the ground".

Of course, he's right. You either have to be rich or well known enough to attract big money to run a presidential campaign -- and he had neither.

His dropping of his campaign was not covered by the mainstream media, which just further proves his point. I doubt that most Democrats will know that he's dropped out of the race, because most of them didn't know he was in the race (or even who he was).

He Blinked

Political Cartoon is by Steve Green in The San Diego Union-Tribune.

Polls Wer Solidly Against Trump On Wall And Shutdown

Trump had no choice but to cave and reopen the government. Poll after poll has shown that a majority don't want the wall, and they blame Trump and the Republicans for the shutdown.

This latest poll is the ABC News / Washington Post Poll -- done between January 21st and 24th of a national sample of 1,001 adults, with a 3.5 point margin of error.

Bloody Shoes

Political Cartoon is by Andy Marlette in the Pensacola News Journal.

Trump Won't Admit It, But He Lost (Bigly)

(Cartoon image is by Jonathan Schmock at jonathanschmock.com.)

There is no other way to describe Trump's acceptance of the reopening of the government. He lost. He swore he would not reopen the government until he got money for his border wall. He didn't get any -- not a penny.

Here's some of what Jennifer Rubin had to say about it in The Washington Post:

Things continue until they don’t. The senseless, cruel government shutdown ended on Friday. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) had vowed she would not give anything until the government reopened. President Trump had promised he wouldn’t reopen the government without funding for his border wall. Now, Pelosi is getting what she wants. Trump has lost. The deal would reopen the government for three weeks to allow a conference committee to discuss border security measures — but not a wall.

Trump said in the Rose Garden that he was “proud” to announce that a deal had been reached, though it was nothing more than a capitulation. . . .

You cannot get thumped any worse than Trump did on this encounter with Pelosi. Each step along the way, the president stumbled. He told Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) “I will be the one to shut it down.” He’d be proud to do it! He wouldn’t blame them! He was then ready to sign a clean continuing resolution — until he listed to Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh and provoked a shutdown anyway.

In the iconic video from December, Schumer can barely contain his laughter. Inside, surely he was jumping up and down, delighting in Trump’s political malpractice.

Since then, Team Trump has shown a total lack of compassion for the 800,000 government workers going unpaid. . . .

Ultimately, what may have convinced Trump to give up were all those polls he insisted that he was discounting. As Trump throws in the towel, a new Post/ABC poll underscores just how unpopular Trump has become during the Trump shutdown. “Public disapproval of President Trump has swelled five points to 58 percent over three months as a majority of Americans continue to hold him and congressional Republicans most responsible for the partial federal government shutdown.” Pelosi has fared much better. (“53 percent blame Trump and congressional Republicans while 34 percent blame Pelosi”). Meanwhile, independents critical to both midterm and presidential elections have fled in droves. Among independents, disapproval has soared from 53 percent in November to 63 percent now, while 54 percent say "Trump and Republicans are more responsible for [the shutdown] while 29 percent blame Pelosi and Democrats.”

We will see whether Trump’s collapse costs him with his base. If so, the bottom will fall out of his ratings. We are left with two final questions: Will there be serious primary challengers to Trump, who’s managed to prove his total incompetence? We’ll see. And will Pelosi get tired of winning? I think not.

Intentional Ignorance

Political Cartoon is by Barry Deutsch at leftycartoons.com.

Religion = Misogyny

Kindness Is Not Weakness

Trump Caves - Will Open Government Without Wall Money

(This caricature of Donald Trump is by DonkeyHotey.)

Donald Trump had shut the government down because Congress had not given him any money to build a wall between the United States and Mexico. He said he would not reopen the government until Congress gave him at least $5.7 billion to start building the wall -- and his shutdown lasted for 35 days, about two weeks longer than any previous shutdown in U.S. history.

But the shutdown didn't work out as Trump expected. He found he was unable to bully Speaker Pelosi into giving him wall money (and Minority Leader Schumer stood solidly with Pelosi). The public blamed Trump for the shutdown, and his poll numbers started going down.

In the end, Trump caved in to the Democrats for the second time this week. The first was when he tried to force Speaker Pelosi into letting him give a State of the Union speech in the House without opening the government. Pelosi shot him down, and he backed off (saying her position was "reasonable"). Yesterday, Trump held a news conference in the White House Rose Garden and again caved. He said he would sign a measure that would open the government until February 15th, while Republicans and Democrats negotiated "border security".

He then spent most of his speech telling a massive number of lies to try and justify that border security including a wall. It's not going to happen. Pelosi (and Schumer) are NOT going to give him any money for a wall. They will agree to more money for border security. Trump will have to be happy with that.

He said if he doesn't get wall money by February 15th, there could be another government shutdown. I don't think he will do that. he was hurt too bad by this shutdown. He might try to declare an emergency and steal military funds and soldiers to try and build his wall without congressional approval. But I think the courts would quickly stop that.

The best Trump can hope for is to try and claim the extra border money is a victory for him. It's not. It's a surrender -- the biggest political loss of his administration. It's now Pelosi-2 and Trump-0. Expect Her to now run up that score.

Pelosi Wins

Political Cartoon is by Mike Thompson in the Detroit Free Press.

The Mueller "Witch Hunt" Nabs Another Trump Witch

The walls continue to close in on Donald Trump, as another of his associates has been indicted and arrested. This time it was Roger Stone -- one of Trump's oldest and closest associates. Stone was arrested by FBI agents early Friday morning. The charges in the indictment are:

* One count of obstruction of an official proceeding

* One count of witness tampering

* Five counts of making false statements

Stone was released of $250,000 bond, with restrictions on where he can travel. After being released, Stone again accused Mueller of just trying to get him to lie about Trump. That's ridiculous. Although Mueller would likely love to have the testimony of any of Trump's associates, that's not why Stone was charged. He was charged because he committed criminal acts, and Mueller has the evidence to prove it.

I think Stone was really just trying to make a show for Trump -- trying to convince him he was loyal and deserved a presidential pardon. That would be a mistake for Trump to do though, since it would look to the nation as obstruction of justice.

Who will be the next of Trump's "witches" to fall? Will it be someone in his family -- Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner, or even Ivanka Trump. It's possible. With each indictment, Mueller seems to be getting closer to Trump.

Witness Tampering

Political Cartoon is by Clay Jones at claytoonz.com.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren Proposes A "Wealth Tax" On The Rich

Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts) is thinking outside the box. She is proposing a different kind of tax. It's not an income tax, but a wealth tax -- and it would apply only to the super-rich.

Here's what she had to say in an e-mail to her supporters:

Here's something to think about:

Right now, an heir with $500 million in yachts and fine art and a public school teacher with no savings can pay the same amount in federal taxes.

The reason? Because people pay federal taxes on their income, not on their wealth. So if that heir and that teacher both make $50,000 in a year, the federal government sees no difference between them.

This isn’t an oversight, Ted, it’s on purpose. It’s because the rich and powerful run Washington, and they make sure the rules are written to benefit themselves.

The top 0.1% of American families – the richest 1 in 1,000 – now have nearly the same amount of wealth as the bottom 90% of American families combined. Meanwhile, for everyone else, opportunity is slipping away.

This is bad for our society, bad for our economy, and bad for our democracy. We need structural change to fix it.

That’s why today I’m proposing a tax on the wealth of the richest Americans. It will only affect the tippy-top 0.1% of the wealthy, those with a net worth of over $50 million. I’m calling it the “Ultra-Millionaire Tax,” and we can use the significant revenue it creates to start rebuilding our middle class.

Experts say that this tax would generate nearly $3 trillion over the next 10 years. That money could help people and grow the economy in a pretty big way.

How? Here’s one idea: We could use that revenue for universal childcare and make sure every parent has access to good, affordable childcare and every kid has access to early education.

Or here’s another: Create a path to student debt relief for the millions of young people getting crushed by student loans.

That’s how we make structural change so our economy works for everyone, not just the people who can afford to hire armies of lobbyists and lawyers.

Our tax laws have been written by the wealthy and well-connected to benefit the wealthy and wealth-connected.

But not for long. We’re building a grassroots movement to return power to the people.
Thanks for being a part of this,

Elizabeth

What do you think about her idea? If you agree, you can sign a petition supporting the idea here.

Wilbur "Marie Antoinette" Ross

Political Cartoon is by John Branch at branchtoon.com.