Tom on Elections (Iowa Caucus Night)

 Elections often have the same inevitability that those old standbys, death and taxes, have long offered.  It's interesting because death and taxes are playing a role in today's festivities.  Taxes are pertinent because Republicans reflexively loathe anything that even hints at being a tax, even as they claim.to be the voice of reason when it comes to fiscal discipline.  I'm dubious about that assertion, because they continue to propose tax cuts for their very favorite cohort of Americans: The Hard working Billionaire plutocrats.  Many of them are too stupid to understand that fiscal salvation stands on a 3 legged stool of: time, (it took decades for us to get into the current mess we face, and it will take just as long to dig our way out of it), a rethinking of our spending priorities, (do we really need to spend a trillion dollars a year on the military? Do we need to lavish large sums of taxpayer dollars on agricultural subsidies, including the ludicrous ethanol subsidies that benefit only Iowa farmers who don't see it as the public welfare scheme  that it really is?),  and increased revenues, (If you want to pay down the national debt, you have to raise the money to do so in an orderly manner.  That means tax hikes.  To think otherwise is nothing more than a case of Magical Thinking).   And Death is creeping around the edges of the DeSantis campaign; licking the place where his lips would be, were he not a skeletal apparition.  

But before any votes are cast, I'll confess that I'm already sick and tired of the campaign. The candidates, have conscripted armies of motivated volunteers, and import  legions of paid staffers who infest every corner of the state, like medieval mendicants beseeching passersby,: crying "Alms for the poor ", and Iowa merchants grow fat on the expenditures of the various campaigns.  They rent cars, buy advertising, and consume meals and liquor as if money were no object.  These folks work hard and play harder, and prostitutes often flock to where the 'action' is, because that's where the money is.  The members of the Fourth Estate: blow-dried avatars of physical beauty and intellectual vacuity who repeatedly state the obvious to an audience of the uncomprehending.  For most of them, campaign coverage is a great adventure, much like those 8th grade field trips to the nation's capital that many of us remember, except that they were children back then and now they're adults with expense accounts and rented rooms. Their spouses are back in DC,  New York, or Atlanta, taking care of the kids and keeping the home fires burning.  You do the math:)

Speaking of expense accounts, some members of the media become legendary for their ability to manipulate their expense accounts to their financial advantage. One such was the legendary Johnny Apple of the NY Times.  He would come up with an outrageous excuse for an eye-popping charge on his expense account.  I recall reading about how he expensed a cashmere overcoat to The Times, claiming that his previous coat had been stolen by ":person or persons unknown", and that since he was at the airport in hot pursuit of a breaking story, the only place that he could find a suitable replacement was at the duty free shop at the airport.  The meals that Mr  Apple consumed on the Times' dime were of the pricey gourmet variety, and those don't come cheap.  

But Apple was probably the best reporter of the second half of the 20th century..There wasn't a big story that he didn't cover, and those he covered, he covered well.  He was most responsible for making the Iowa Caucuses the kickoff to the quadrennial spectacle that the presidential elections that it is today, when he relentlessly covered Jimmy Carter's 1976 trek through Iowa, making him a legitimate contender in the national consciousness.  In a sense, Jimmy Carter owes his presidency to Johnny Apple and The Allman Brothers Band, who pioneered the use of benefit concerts as a fundraising machine. 

After tonight, the circus folds its tent and moves on to New Hampshire.  The merchants and vendors will count their money, the volunteers will resume their mundane lives, and a couple of them will mout campaigns for seats on their local school boards and town councils because, once bitten by the political bug, nothing else will do.  It's showtime and I, for one, plan to watch some football and dine on fishsticks.  Have a pleasant evening...

Tom on Indictments and Elections

 Donald Trump received a target letter from the special prosecutor in the matter of the events surrounding the insurrection of 6 January 2021 a couple of days ago. 

 A target letter almost always precedes an indictment, which would make 3 so far with at least one more case pending.

In the Senate, Tommy Tuberville is continuing to block nominations for newly promoted flag officers, and his colleague, Rand Paul (R-KY),is similarly blocking appointments of upper level State Department appointees, including a number of Ambassadors. But the most consequential development of recent days comes to us from  Michigan 

 Yesterday, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel charged 16 individuals with electoral fraud in a scheme to replace Michigan's electors, who were Democrats chosen by the voters of the Wolverine State.

 Remember: When we vote for President, we're actually voting for a slate of electors who will, in turn, elect the president when the Electoral College meets. General Nesson has shown great wisdom by resisting the impulse to charge 'national' Republicans, such as Trump, Giuliani, et al because, in the final analysis, these are state cases which have no businesses in federal courts. We can only hope that Attorneys General in states such as Georgia, Wisconsin, and Arizona, where like  charges are under consideration, show similar restraint 

 This is the point in the election cycle where third party initiatives begin to appear. It doesn't happen in every cycle, but when it does, it has the potential of being game-changing, especially in these days when national elections are often decided by a relatively small number of votes.

 In 1980, Illinois congressman John Anderson may have siphoned off enough votes from Jimmy Carter to tip the 1980 election to Ronald Reagan.

 In 1992 the quirky and entertaining H Ross Perot insurgency denied George HW Bush a second term in office,  and in 2000 Ralph Nader's vanity campaign gave us George W Bush and Dick Cheney.

 In 2016 Dr Jill Stein sucked just enough votes away from Hillary Clinton to give us Donald Trump.

 As you can see, third party candidacies tend to work against Democrats. The reason is that for Progressive Democrats the perfect is the enemy of the good. They are more concerned with ideological purity than with electability. While Democrats squabble among themselves, Republicans stick together and win elections.  

 Which brings us to the 'No Labels initiative. It's a group founded by former Sen Joe Lieberman, who has made a fetish out of bipartisanship. The group proposes to run a third party candidate for president in 2024, and that human 'turd in the punchbowl', Sen Joe Manchin, (D-WV), is thinking about a run.  The reason that Manchin is even considering what he must surely realize is a quixotic run, is because he's up for re-election next year in a state that has become so red that most observers give him little chance of holding on to his seat .Manchin, like a number of 2024 Republican candidates, is actually auditioning for a cabinet post in what they hope will be a Trump Restoration. In Manchin's case, he's a candidate for Secretary of Coal.