Trump Could be a Huge Asset for Democrats This Fall

Donald Trump's defining characteristic - even more than his pathological lying - is his malignant narcissism.  Everything is ALWAYS about him and he simply cannot accept anything or anyone that doesn't support his "Sun King" vision of himself.  The good news is that this characteristic may help Democrats retake control of the House of Representatives - and with luck, the U.S. Senate.  Trump forgets that a huge number of voters failed to vote in the 2016 presidential election and that his win traces to only about 27% of voters and a 70,000 vote spread across three states.  If those who stayed home (or those who feel they made a huge mistake) turn out in disgust with Trump and/or the GOP's reverse Robin Hood policies, things could be brutal for Republicans.  A piece in New York Magazine looks at how Trump may further wound the GOP.  Here are highlights:

One of President Trump’s most bedrock character traits is his refusal to truly reckon with any piece of information that reflects poorly on him. This self-aggrandizing, reality-denying flavor of egotism has defined Trump for decades, through his roller-coaster business career and into political life. In recent months, it has sometimes veered into the straight-up delusional, as when he reportedly claimed last year that it wasn’t actually his voice on the Access Hollywood tape.

Trump’s insistence that everything is going great was validated in unprecedented fashion when he won the presidency despite some of the strongest headwinds imaginable, shocking almost everyone — possibly including, on some deep level, himself.

But now, finally, [Trump's] the president’s unwavering confidence may finally be about to take a serious electoral toll.  The New York Times reported on Saturday that in the runup to the midterm elections this fall, President Trump is simply not listening to advisers and lawmakers who tell him what anyone can plainly see: Republicans are in deep trouble:

Congressional and party leaders and even some Trump aides are concerned that [Trump's] the president’s boundless self-assurance about politics will cause him to ignore or undermine their midterm strategy. In battleground states like Arizona, Florida and Nevada, Mr. Trump’s proclivity to be a loose cannon could endanger the Republican incumbents and challengers who are already facing ferocious Democratic headwinds. In election after election over the last year and a half, Democrats have vastly over performed their expected vote share, largely thanks to animus toward the president. They have triumphed in a Pennsylvania Congressional district where Trump won by more than 20 points, picked up a Senate seat in ruby-red Alabama, dominated state races in Virginia, and made close several contests that almost certainly would have been Republican landslides in previous years. . . . Republicans have been sounding the alarm for months.

Trump’s reaction to all this: everything will be just fine.

The Times piece also reports that, as his fellow Republicans fret, Brad Parscale, [Trump's] the president’s pollster, is feeding him inaccurate, Trump-friendly poll numbers, which [Trump] the president is more than happy to parade on Twitter.

Why does this matter? Most presidents, even if they claim not to be obsessed with polls the way Trump is, have a pretty good idea of their own political currency, and adjust their alignment with their parties accordingly.

Something different is going on this time around. President Trump remains enormously popular within the Republican Party; most Republican members of Congress have made the calculation that even if Trump is underwater in their state, defying Trump the president would be a political loser, since it leave them without any reliable constituency.

The problem is not only that Trump refuses to believe that Republicans will lose, but that, even if he were sufficiently worried, he doesn’t care enough about his own party to bother helping.

Establishment Republicans reportedly want Trump to flog the GOP’s unpopular tax law on the campaign trail. [Trump] The president is pushing back on this directive — which he is right to do, since the unpopular law probably isn’t galvanizing anyone to vote.

But [Trump's] the president’s own, predictably unpredictable routine is unlikely to work much better. He might attack vulnerable Republican Senators he disagrees with; he might serve more as a distraction than a cheerleader, . . . This routine won’t turn off voters who already love [Trump] the president. But it’s more likely to spark another Trump news cycle than rally much-needed enthusiasm for Republican candidates.

The GOP’s best hope may be to invent reasons that red-state Democrats are hurting Trump personally, then watch him go wild on Twitter and the campaign trail.

Republicans seem to have grasped the lesson that Trump needs to be personally invested in their election results. They are trying to make the stakes of the election startlingly personal, reportedly telling Trump that if he doesn’t help them out this fall, they may not have his back if and when Democrats initiate impeachment proceedings next year. That stark warning may perk Trump’s ears up, but it’s just as likely to be perceived as an unacceptable intramural threat, not as motivation to work for the party.

[Trump] will continue living in a bubble of his own making. Because Trump was right to dismiss the concerns of the many, many people who insisted he couldn’t win in 2016, he can now perennially point to that shocking election result as proof that his instincts, not some politico egghead’s, are always correct. And if Republicans lose big this year, he’ll just say they didn’t stick by him closely enough.

It’s a dishonest, solipsitic approach to life. But it’s one that has worked shockingly well for Donald Trump.

Will America's Institutions Save It?

Yet another editorial compares the misrule of Trump/Pence to the reign of the Roman emperor Caligula.   Like the current occupant of the White House, Caligula made wild boasts, was a narcissist and had no experience in ruling when he took power.  Overall, the results were disastrous yet the empire survived for another 400 years due to the ingrained nature of its institutions.   Historical sources note as follows about his four (4) year rule:

[H]e is described as a noble and moderate ruler during the first six months of his reign. After this, the sources focus upon his cruelty, sadism, extravagance, and sexual perversity, presenting him as an insane tyrant. . . . . . it is known that during his brief reign, Caligula worked to increase the unconstrained personal power of the emperor, . . . 

Eventually, Caligula's excesses and alienation of the Senate became so great that he was assassinated and Rome moved onward in greater power and prosperity.  Here are highlights from the editorial that draws disturbing parallels:

What happens when the people of a great nation gradually realize that their leader may not be, er, quite right in the head?

When Caligula became Roman emperor in A.D. 37, the people rejoiced. “On all sides, you could see nothing but altars and sacrifices, men and women decked in their holiday best and smiling,” according to the first-century writer Philo.

The Senate embraced him, and he was hailed as a breath of fresh air after the dourness, absenteeism and miserliness of his great-uncle, Emperor Tiberius. Caligula was colorful and flamboyant, offering plenty of opportunities for ribald gossip. Caligula had four wives in rapid succession, and he was said to be sleeping with his sister. (Roman historians despised him, so some of the gossip should be treated skeptically.)

He was charming, impetuous and energetic, sleeping only three hours a night, and he displayed a common touch as he constantly engaged with the public. His early months as emperor brimmed with hope.

Initially, Caligula focused on denouncing his predecessor and reversing everything that he had done. Caligula also made popular promises of tax reform so as to reduce the burden on the public. He was full of grandiose pledges of infrastructure projects, such as a scheme to cut through the Isthmus of Corinth.

But, alas, Caligula had no significant government experience, and he proved utterly incompetent at actually getting things done. Meanwhile, his personal extravagance actually increased the need for tax revenue. . . . This led to increasingly desperate, cruel and tyrannical behavior.

A coward himself, Caligula was said to delight in the torture of others; rumor had it that he would tell his executioners: “Kill him so that he can feel he is dying.”

Caligula, a narcissist and megalomaniac, became increasingly unhinged.  . . . . The Senate, dignified and traditional, watched Caligula with increasing alarm.

Yet as Caligula wreaked havoc, Rome also had values, institutions and mores that inspired resistance. He offended practically everyone, he couldn’t deliver on his promises, his mental stability was increasingly doubted and he showed he simply had no idea how to govern. Within a few years, he had lost all support, and the Praetorian Guard murdered him in January 41 (not a path I would ever condone).

To me, the lesson is that Rome was able to inoculate itself against unstable rulers so that it could recover and rise to new glories. Even the greatest of nations may suffer a catastrophic leader, but the nation can survive the test and protect its resilience — if the public stays true to its values, institutions and traditions. That was true two millennia ago, and remains true today.

The question today is this: when will the Cabinet or the American Congress act to remove the American Caligula from office?

Republicans Remain in Denial About Donald Trump

To me, it was always obvious with anyone who bothered to really look at Donald Trump's career and personal life that the man was manifestly unfit for the White House.  Only deliberate refusal to see the man as he truly is - or affection for his racist, hate-filled xenophobic messaging - could justify having cast a vote for him.  And now that he is in the White House, Republican friends for the most part don't want to talk about him, much less argue as to why they voted correctly since, in their hearts, many I suspect realize that they made a horrific mistake that is inflicting incalculable harm to America.  Others, however, remain in denial, especially in the South and Mid-Western states where Trump has delivered no new jobs as he promised he would do, yet systemic racism and/or religious extremism continue to appeal those who voted for a morally bankrupt individual in the first place.  A few Republicans, however, are waking to the reality of what they have done to the country.  One is Republican Senator Jeff Flake who unloads on Trump and by extension the GOP in a new book. Politico has some excerpts from the book.  Here are some highlights:

Who could blame the people who felt abandoned and ignored by the major parties for reaching in despair for a candidate who offered oversimplified answers to infinitely complex questions and managed to entertain them in the process? With hindsight, it is clear that we all but ensured the rise of Donald Trump.

I will let the liberals answer for their own sins in this regard. (There are many.) But we conservatives mocked Barack Obama’s failure to deliver on his pledge to change the tone in Washington even as we worked to assist with that failure. It was we conservatives who, upon Obama’s election, stated that our No. 1 priority was not advancing a conservative policy agenda but making Obama a one-term president—the corollary to this binary thinking being that his failure would be our success and the fortunes of the citizenry would presumably be sorted out in the meantime. It was we conservatives who were largely silent when the most egregious and sustained attacks on Obama’s legitimacy were leveled by marginal figures who would later be embraced and legitimized by far too many of us.

To carry on in the spring of 2017 as if what was happening was anything approaching normalcy required a determined suspension of critical faculties. And tremendous powers of denial.

I’ve been sympathetic to this impulse to denial, as one doesn’t ever want to believe that the government of the United States has been made dysfunctional at the highest levels, especially by the actions of one’s own party. Michael Gerson, a con­servative columnist and former senior adviser to President George W. Bush, wrote, four months into the new presidency, “The conservative mind, in some very visible cases, has become diseased,” and conservative institutions “with the blessings of a president … have abandoned the normal constraints of reason and compassion.”

Under our Constitution, there simply are not that many people who are in a position to do something about an executive branch in chaos. As the first branch of government (Article I), the Congress was designed expressly to assert itself at just such moments. It is what we talk about when we talk about “checks and balances.” Too often, we observe the unfolding drama along with the rest of the country, passively, all but saying, “Someone should do something!” without seeming to realize that that someone is us. And so, that unnerving silence in the face of an erratic executive branch is an abdication, and those in positions of leadership bear particular responsibility.

But where does such capitulation take us? If by 2017 the conservative bargain was to go along for the very bumpy ride because with congressional hegemony and the White House we had the numbers to achieve some long-held policy goals—even as we put at risk our institutions and our values—then it was a very real question whether any such policy victories wouldn’t be Pyrrhic ones.  If this was our Faustian bargain, then it was not worth it.

Even as our own government was documenting a con­certed attack against our democratic processes by an enemy foreign power, our own White House was rejecting the authority of its own intelligence agencies, disclaiming their findings as a Democratic ruse and a hoax. Conduct that would have had conservatives up in arms had it been exhibited by our political opponents now had us dumbstruck.

So, where should Republicans go from here? First, we shouldn’t hesitate to speak out if the president “plays to the base” in ways that damage the Republican Party’s ability to grow and speak to a larger audience. Second, Republicans need to take the long view when it comes to issues like free trade: Populist and protectionist policies might play well in the short term, but they handicap the country in the long term. Third, Republicans need to stand up for institutions and prerogatives, like the Senate filibuster, that have served us well for more than two centuries.

We have taken our “institutions conducive to freedom,” as Goldwater put it, for granted as we have engaged in one of the more reckless periods of politics in our history. In 2017, we seem to have lost our appreciation for just how hard won and vulnerable those institutions are.

Flake sounds like he should leave the GOP.  The Republican Party that he calls for has ceased to exist and can only change when the majority of Americans get motivated and vote and send it into electoral exile.  That is the only way to kill the Frankenstein monster in the White House that the GOP has created.

Gorsuch: Skeptical That LGBT People Deserve Rights

Today Senate Republicans used the "nuclear option" to kill the filibuster of U.S. Supreme Court nominees so that now justices can be approved for a lifetime appointment by a mere 1 vote majority. The result is that a man who cannot win 60 votes out of 100 will likely be appointed to the Supreme Court tomorrow where he will influence and determine legal rights for all Americans for possibly 30 years or more.  As a potentially swing vote, Gorsuch will literally decide who has legal rights and protections and who will not. Yes, I am aware that Gorsuch received unanimous approval on a voice vote for his appointment to the Court of Appeals as Republicans have disingenuously bloviated over and over again.   The GOP talking points, however, ignore decisions Gorsuch has participated in at the Court of Appeals and other subsequent statements and actions which show him to be unfit for the U.S. Supreme Court.  To me, the telling case was Hobby Lobby where Gorsuch's Court of Appeals opinion - as did the Supreme Court decision - placed legend and myth based religious belief of Christofascists over the civil rights (and physical autonomy rights) of others. A piece in The Advocate looks at Gorsuch's beliefs that LGBT individuals do not deserve equal civil rights.  Here are excerpts:

[T]he Senate will vote on the nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court against a multilayered backdrop of opposition. Opposition that, for many LGBTQ rights advocates, only increased after Gorsuch’s confirmation hearings. During these hearings, Gorsuch referred to Obergefell v. Hodges, the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court case that recognized marriage equality, as “settled law.”

This acknowledgement should have come as a relief to many, particularly as the team of people with whom I work at the National Center for Lesbian Rights helped bring this case to the Supreme Court. However, it is cold comfort because after a slew of carefully worded answers, Gorsuch refused to affirm the legal reasoning underlying the court’s interpretation of constitutional protections for the LGBTQ community. Gorsuch has also endorsed the view that religious beliefs can justify discrimination, even when others are harmed. A vote to confirm Gorsuch would jeopardize the LGBTQ community’s hard-won achievement of basic freedom and constitutional rights.

Gorsuch is deeply skeptical of the fundamental constitutional rights recognized by the Supreme Court that ensure fair and equal treatment for LGBTQ people. The fact that the cases striking down antisodomy laws (Lawrence v. Texas) and recognizing marriage equality (Obergefell v. Hodges) have already been decided should not make us complacent. Right now there is a concerted effort by anti-LGBTQ organizations and elected officials to nullify Obergefell by contending that while it may require states to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, it does not require equal treatment of married same-sex couples. The Arkansas Supreme Court recently issued a decision based on that very argument, holding that Obergefell does not require equal treatment of married same-sex couples with respect to the issuance of birth certificates for their children. And a few weeks ago the Texas Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case in which state officials are arguing that Obergefell does not require equal employment benefits for same-sex spouses.

These are real, not hypothetical, concerns, and we have every reason to be gravely concerned that Judge Gorsuch would permit Obergefell and other decisions involving fundamental rights to be effectively nullified were he to be confirmed.

Gorsuch also espouses a breathtakingly broad view of religious liberty, one that allows virtually anyone who expresses a religious objection to opt out of laws with which they disagree. His ruling in the Hobby Lobby case (involving employee access to contraceptive coverage) before it reached the Supreme Court gave no consideration to the employees’ health care needs and instead endorsed a view of “complicity” that is sweeping and alarming. Under his reasoning, a religious objection to doing something that might even very indirectly facilitate conduct that violates the objector’s faith is enough to allow for an opt-out.

Religious refusals have long been a significant problem in the realm of reproductive health care, and we now see such refusals surfacing around nondiscrimination laws and the right to marry, which are core concerns for the LGBTQ community. Private businesses are fighting in court for the right to deny services to same-sex couples, states are introducing laws to allow sweeping religious opt-outs from nondiscrimination laws, and employers are citing Hobby Lobby to justify firing transgender employees. Elevating Gorsuch to the Supreme Court would be a serious setback to the equality of LGBTQ people for which we have all fought so hard.

We fear that with Judge Gorsuch on the bench, this continual exercise of securing freedom for all by applying the Constitution’s “central protections” will be halted and many, including LGBTQ people, would be left out in the cold.

Like far to many heterosexual white males, Gorsuch has no clue of the struggles that face LGBT citizens and other minorities.  Worse yet, from his refusals to answers questions and coy responses to others, the take away is that he simply does not care because they do not impact him.  This lack of empathy and concern for others - or even the ability to recognize them as equally human - has become a hallmark of today's largely Christofascist controlled Republican Party. 

Tea Party Idiocy Run Amok in Mississippi

Mississippi and Conservative States - Pigs at the Federal Trough

Not to sound mean, but increasingly I find myself thinking that in order to be a Tea Party supporter one must be either (i) incredibly stupid, (ii) out right insane, or (iii) have had a lobotomy.  A case in point is the State of Mississippi, perhaps the largest recipient of federal government welfare on a per capita basis, where Tea Party loons are pushing to unseat a sitting Republican Senator who brought lots of federal money to the state.  Sadly, Tea Party supporters in Mississippi are not unique in their apparent stupidity.  One sees a similar phenomenon in Southwest Virginia which receives far more state and federal tax dollars than it pays.  A column in the Washington Post looks at this idiocy.  Here are highlights:

Can you hate the federal government but love the money it spends on you?   The electoral earthquake that was Mississippi’s Republican Senate primary has pushed this question to the forefront of U.S. politics.

In conventional terms, the success of state Sen. Chris McDaniel in outpolling Thad Cochran, a 34-year Senate veteran, on Tuesday and forcing him into a June 24 runoff was a triumph for the tea party movement. Outside conservative groups such as FreedomWorks and the Club for Growth spent millions trying to oust a gracious and civil incumbent they saw as far too cozy with Washington’s big spenders. 

Mississippi taxpayers get $3.07 back for every $1 they send to Washington, according to Wallet Hub, a personal finance Web site . The Tax Foundation ranks Mississippi No. 1 among the states in federal aid as a percentage of state revenue. 

Strange numbers, you’d think, for a Beltway-hating state, but Marty Wiseman, the former director of the Stennis Institute at Mississippi State University, explained the apparent inconsistency. “Our anti-Washington politics has been to make sure that we got as much of it here as we could,” he said. “You’ve got the tea party excited that they’ve corralled a big spender, but he was bringing it back to Mississippi. That’s the paradox of all paradoxes.”

Indeed. “If Mississippi did what the tea party claims they want . . . we would become a Third World country, quickly,” said Rickey Cole, the state Democratic chairman. “We depend on the federal government to help us build our highways. We depend on the federal government to fund our hospitals, our health-care system. We depend on the federal government to help us educate our students on every level.”

Cole noted that the hospital he was born in “wasn’t built by the taxpayers of Mississippi, it was built with federal money that was collected from taxpayers in New York and Chicago and L.A. and San Francisco.”

McDaniel, Stevens said, “is always talking about cutting spending. No one has ever asked Chris McDaniel what he’s going to cut.” Stevens added: “Is he going to cut community colleges in his district? Is he going to cut highway funds to his district?” 

These queries will certainly appeal to Democrat Travis Childers, the rather conservative former member of Congress who handily won his party’s Senate nomination on Tuesday. Cochran supporters believe that a McDaniel nomination could lead to the unthinkable. “The concern is that this would open the door for a potential Democratic senator,” Philip Gunn, the Republican speaker of the Mississippi House, told me the night before the primary. Childers’s “chances against McDaniel are better than his chances against Cochran.”

Yes, Childers could run as a Thad Cochran Democrat — except he wouldn’t be saddled with the need to appease an ideology that has to pretend federal spending doesn’t benefit anybody, least of all the people of Mississippi.

Filibuster Reform - A Return to Democracy in the Senate?

Some have decried the Democrat's use of the so-called "nuclear option" which removed the 60 vote requirement to move legislation forward in the United States Senate.   Rush Limbaugh, always the demagogue equated it with rape.  But the reality is that since Barack Obama's election in 2008, Republicans have shamelessly used a 60 vote filibuster rule to block nominations and judicial appointments that otherwise had the votes for passage.  It has been and endless scene of obstructionism.  Meanwhile, in the House of Representatives the so-called "Hastert Rule" - which requires majority support of the majority party - has been used for similar effect to kill legislation that has majority vote support.  These rules make a mockery of the vision for government crafted by the Founding Fathers.  The New York Times opines on the end of a significant portion of the 60 vote filibuster rule.  Here are excerpts:

For five years, Senate Republicans have refused to allow confirmation votes on dozens of perfectly qualified candidates nominated by President Obama for government positions. They tried to nullify entire federal agencies by denying them leaders. They abused Senate rules past the point of tolerance or responsibility. And so they were left enraged and threatening revenge on Thursday when a majority did the only logical thing and stripped away their power to block the president’s nominees. 

In a 52-to-48 vote that substantially altered the balance of power in Washington, the Senate changed its most infuriating rule and effectively ended the filibuster on executive and judicial appointments. From now on, if any senator tries to filibuster a presidential nominee, that filibuster can be stopped with a simple majority, not the 60-vote requirement of the past. That means a return to the democratic process of giving nominees an up-or-down vote, allowing them to be either confirmed or rejected by a simple majority.

This vote was long overdue. “I have waited 18 years for this moment,” said Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa. 

It would have been unthinkable just a few months ago, when the majority leader, Harry Reid, was still holding out hope for a long-lasting deal with Republicans and insisting that federal judges, because of their lifetime appointments, should still be subject to supermajority thresholds. But Mr. Reid, along with all but three Senate Democrats, was pushed to act by the Republicans’ refusal to allow any appointments to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, just because they wanted to keep a conservative majority on that important court. 

Republicans warned that the rule change could haunt the Democrats if they lost the White House and the Senate. But the Constitution gives presidents the right to nominate top officials in their administration and name judges, and it says nothing about the ability of a Senate minority to stop them. (The practice barely existed before the 1970s.) From now on, voters will have to understand that presidents are likely to get their way on nominations if their party controls the Senate. 

Given the extreme degree of Republican obstruction during the Obama administration, the Democrats had little choice but to change the filibuster rule. As Mr. Reid noted on the floor, half of all filibusters waged against nominations in Senate history have occurred since Mr. Obama was elected. Twenty of his district court nominees were filibustered; only three such filibusters took place before he took office.
[T]he vote may lead to broader filibuster changes. A proposal by several younger Democratic senators to require “talking filibusters” — forcing objecting lawmakers to stand up at length and make their cases — may well gain steam now, and it could finally spell an end to logjams that have prevented important legislation from reaching votes.

Today’s vote was an appropriate use of that power, and it was necessary to turn the Senate back into a functioning legislative body.

GOP Senate Candidate Addresses Neo-Confederate Group That Promotes Secessionism

Only in today's Republican Party and in the Deep South will one find a candidate for the United States Senate appearing at a conference of Neo-Confederates who advocate secession.  Welcome to GOP dysfunction writ large.   Seemingly, there is no limit to what is acceptable in today's GOP.  The crazier and more extreme, the more welcome batshitery is within the party base.  All of which, in my view relates back to the rise of the Christofascists in the Republican Party.  Only the broad influence of those who deny science, deny objective reality and oppose all forms of modernity can explain Chris McDaniel who is in the words of Mother Jones, taking the "GOP Civil War" to a new level.  Here are highlights from the Mother Jones piece:

Chris McDaniel is taking the "GOP Civil War" to a new level. Two months ago, the tea party-backed Mississippi Senate candidate addressed a neo-Confederate conference and costume ball hosted by a group that promotes the work of present-day secessionists and contends the wrong side won the "war of southern independence." Other speakers at the event included a historian who believes Lincoln was a Marxist and Ryan Walters, a PhD candidate who worked on McDaniel's first political campaign and wrote recently that the "controversy" over President Barack Obama's birth certificate "hasn't really been solved." 

McDaniel, a state senator, is challenging incumbent Republican Sen. Thad Cochran in next summer's GOP Senate primary. After announcing his run last week, McDaniel quickly picked up endorsements from the Club for Growth and the Senate Conservatives Fund, a political action committee founded by former Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), a prominent backer of the tea party. Both groups are key players in the internal GOP battle between establishment-minded Republicans and tea party insurgents and are backing right-wing challenges to incumbent Republicans whom they deem insufficiently conservative.  


With their endorsements of McDaniel, the Senate Conservatives Fund and the Club for Growth have shown just how far they are willing to go in terms of embracing the far right to prosecute their war for the soul of the party. In August, McDaniel addressed a neo-Confederate conference in Laurel, Miss., near his hometown of Ellisville. A local chapter of the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV), the Jones County Rosin Heels, hosted the two-day event, which the group described in invitations as a "Southern Heritage Conference" for "politically incorrect folks."

The Rosin Heels does more than regret the outcome of the Civil War. Its monthly newsletter routinely features articles and essays advocating for present-day secession. Its August newsletter highlighted the seven-year-old "Burlington Declaration" from the First North American Secession Convention, which stated that the right of secession was a "[truth] of natural law and the human experience."  . . . .A note from the editor stated that "we are living in the times that Jefferson Davis predicted would one day come," in which the conflicts that presaged the Civil War would flare up again. The June issue compared Obama's policies to the ravages of Reconstruction: "Our people have had to put up with for the last FIFTEEN DECADES!!!"

McDaniel was joined at the Southern Heritage Conference by Al Benson, a historian from Louisiana, who talked about his book Red Republicans & Lincoln Marxists, which speculates that Lincoln's actions during the Civil War were influenced by the writings of Karl Marx.

Hobnobbing with birthers and Lost Causers may not be an impediment for McDaniel as he tries to dethrone Cochran—he is, after all, in Mississippi. According a 2011 survey from Public Policy Polling, only 47 percent of Mississippians—and 21 percent of Mississippi Republicans—were satisfied with the outcome of the Civil War.

Again, only in today's insane GOP would folks like McDaniel be taken seriously.

Senate Republicans Splinter As Moderates Rise Up

Unlike GOP House members who have the advantage of running for reelection in carefully gerrymandered districts, members of the U.S. Senate have to run for reelection on a statewide basis and hence find pandering to the spittle flecked Christofascists and modern day descendants of the KKK much more dangerous to their reelection chances.  The result, thankfully, is that infighting is increasing among lunatic far right senators and those who have to embrace moderation.  A piece in Talking Points Memo looks at the unfolding drama.  Here are highlights:

Whether it’s immigration reform, the budget, or President Obama’s nominees, a faction of more moderate Republican senators are increasingly splitting from both their leadership and the tea party and partnering with Democrats on key issues.

The growing signs of division are remarkable after years of exceptional Senate GOP unity under the reign of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), during which minority use of the filibuster to thwart governance has soared to unprecedented heights.

This week, large numbers of Republicans, led by Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), broke with McConnell and voted with Democrats to secure the confirmation of controversial Obama nominees to the Labor Department, Environmental Protection Agency and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. In all eight cloture and confirmation votes, McConnell voted “no.”

The most controversial nominee so far, Tom Perez for labor secretary, overcame a GOP filibuster by the thinnest of margins, 60-40. The six Republicans who joined Democrats in his favor, whom Democrats will look to for cooperation on other matters, were Sens. McCain, Bob Corker (TN), Lamar Alexander (TN), Susan Collins (ME), Mark Kirk (IL) and Lisa Murkowski (AK).

On immigration, 14 Republicans joined every Democrat in voting to comprehensively overhaul the system and offer unauthorized immigrants a path to citizenship.

On the budget, numerous Republican senators are urging conservative colleagues to stop blocking conference negotiations with the House, and are pushing for a long-term budget agreement with Democrats that includes new revenues — anathema to the tea party.

Complicating matters for leadership is that McConnell and his No. 2, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), are both unpopular at home and face reelection next year. As a result, they’re working to ward off primary challengers by voting against Democratic initiatives as much as possible and avoiding the appearance of working with President Obama. That makes it harder for them to balance the concerns of rank and file members, who watched their party get crushed in a second consecutive presidential election and aren’t eager to spend another four years obstructing.

But it remains to be seen whether the divisions will usher in a new era of Senate cooperation, as McCain strikes a conciliatory posture with his 2008 rival on upcoming battles involving the debt ceiling and nominees to the influential D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Senate Immigration Reform Supporters Targets House Republicans

With immigration reform legislation approved by the U. S. Senate, the battle now goes to the GOP controlled House of Representatives where racism and extremism are the main hallmarks of House Republicans as they pander to the ugliest elements of the GOP base: angry elderly whites, white supremacists and, of course, the Christofascists who are anything but loving Christians.   Whether or not Senate Republicans can force the GOP House members to do what's right will remain to be seen.  Politico looks at the coming conflict within the GOP.  Here are excerpts:

Big Business, Senate Republicans and Democrats backing immigration reform have a target in their crosshairs: House Republicans.

Senators like John McCain (R-Ariz), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) met with tech giants such as Microsoft, Google and Intel, and pro reform groups like FWD.us to discuss a coordinated campaign to target more than 100 House Republicans on reforming the nation’s immigration laws when they are at home in their districts over the next month, according to sources familiar with the meeting.

Graham suggested getting people to target Republicans at town hall meetings. Schumer said he wanted pastors giving sermons about the need for immigration reform.

McCain urged the group to push for the Senate bill by discussing its component parts — but not mentioning the overall bill.  Graham said that there are between 30 and 40 Republicans who are staunchly opposed to the Senate bill — but warned that number cannot grow.

It’s not too often that you hear about Republicans and Democrats privately discussing targeting each other to support legislation, but it’s clear that senators see their comprehensive immigration reform effort hitting stiff resistance in the House. McCain suggested to the group that they’re losing the messaging battle to immigration opponents.

The GOP leadership of the House believes that nearly all Republicans oppose the Senate bill.  ”The House will not take up the Senate immigration bill. There are many issues related to immigration reform on which the business community, religious groups and House Republicans can find common ground, but advocating for the House consideration of the Senate immigration bill is simply a waste of their time and resources,” one House GOP leadership aide said.

Liz "Mini Me" Cheney Announces Senate to Challenge GOP Incumbent

In my view, perhaps one of the foulest figures in more recent U.S. Political history - it's a toss up with Richard Nixon - is Dick Cheney, a/k/a Emperor Palpatine Cheney on this blog.  Cheney almost single handedly led the cretin like George W. Bush around by the nose and precipitated the disasters in Afghanistan and Iraq which resulted in thousands of American deaths and billions of squandered American taxpayer dollars.  Now, Emperor Palpatines's daughter - who is the antithesis to Princess Leah - has announced that she will run for the U. S. Senate seat for Wyoming in the 2014 election.  Never mind that she has never actually lived in Wyoming until recently.  Thankfully, Wyoming Republicans are not amused and the official party apparatus is likely to oppose Ms. Cheney.  An intra-party bloodbath would obviously be delicious to watch.  Here are highlights from Politico:

Liz Cheney announced Tuesday that she will challenge Wyoming Sen. Mike Enzi in a Republican primary next year.  The daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney made the announcement in a six-minute YouTube video. Most of her announcement was an attack on President Barack Obama, with only a veiled swipe at the incumbent.

Enzi, 69, announced Tuesday that he will run for a fourth term. He said at the Capitol that Cheney did not give him a heads up and defiantly insisted that her move will not dissuade him.

National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Jerry Moran, a senator from Kansas, announced that the official party body will back Enzi.

Cheney, 46, worked in the State Department and the Agency for International Development during the George W. Bush administration. But she moved her family to Jackson Hole last year and has traveled aggressively around the state laying the foundation for what everyone assumed would be a political bid.

Wyoming’s other senator, Sen. John Barrasso, quickly endorsed Enzi.  “Mike Enzi is a friend, a mentor and a tremendous US Senator for Wyoming,” Barrasso said. “I support his reelection.”

Another Republican with extensive ties to the fundraising world predicted that Cheney would collect strong support from national security conservatives, including the influential world of pro-Israel donors.

[A] prominent Liz Cheney candidacy in 2014 may come as an unwelcome development for some national Republicans who are seeking to rebrand the GOP after a disappointing 2014 cycle.

The Cheney name is not exactly a beloved calling card in national politics. The family has deep history in Wyoming and Dick Cheney is the state’s most important politician in modern times; nationally, the former vice president is one of the least popular national figures in recent memory.

And the Cheneys are inextricably linked to a brand of interventionist foreign policy thinking that has plummeted in public popularity.

The Enzi-Cheney race may create a variety of unconventional fault lines on the right. In a race between Enzi, a conservative incumbent who also supported an Internet sales tax, and Cheney, an ultra-hawkish candidate from the D.C. area, there’s not necessarily an obvious choice for anti-establishment activists.

Time to Emigrate? Nate Silver Predicts GOP Holding 50-51 Senate Seats After 2014 Election

It is stunning at times to see progressive causes and equality advancing in South America and in Europe - even in South Africa - yet America seems at times to be lurching backwards with racists, bigots and foul religious extremists either in ascendancy or not plummeting in a death spiral as they deserve.  In America a main representative of this regressive process is today's Republican Party with a party base that stinks of racism, worships ignorance, and holds anyone deemed as  "other"  - which is virtually anyone who isn't a conservative white conservative Christian - with open contempt.  And despite this, gay statistics nerd Nate Silver predicts that the GOP may make major gains in the U. S. Senate in 2014.  Currently, the Senate is the only obstacle to passage of extremist legislation passed by the gerrymandered GOP controlled House of Representatives.  If the GOP were to take control of the Senate, other than a presidential veto, there would be no stopping GOP insanity and bigotry.    Hence my question, is it time to bail and emigrate?  Talking Points Memo looks at Silver's current predictions:

Following former Gov. Brian Schweitzer's decision not to run for Montana’s open U.S. Senate seat this weekend, New York Times polling guru Nate Silver predicted Monday that Republicans will hold 50 to 51 seats in the upper chamber after all ballots are counted in the 2014 Congressional mid-term elections.

Silver hedges in his prediction by reminding his readers that the outcome will be affected by several factors, namely local variables, the quality of candidates yet chosen by both Democrats and Republicans, economic indicators and President Barack Obama's approval rating.

It is equally important to look for early indications of whether G.O.P. primary voters will be more tolerant of moderate and “main street” Republicans than they were in 2010 and 2012. A strong set of Republican nominees could give the party as many as a dozen credible opportunities to pick up the seats they need – whereas a weaker series of candidates could require them to win almost all of the races that remained competitive after the primaries.

Read Silver's full state-by-state analysis here.

Silver hedges in his prediction by reminding his readers that the outcome will be affected by several factors, namely local variables, the quality of candidates yet chosen by both Democrats and Republicans, economic indicators and President Barack Obama's approval rating.

Read Silver's full state-by-state analysis here.

 Silver does have these caveats:

It is therefore important to watch macro-level indicators – especially Mr. Obama’s approval ratings, the generic Congressional ballot and major economic measures – in addition to following the recruitment and polling in individual states.

It is equally important to look for early indications of whether G.O.P. primary voters will be more tolerant of moderate and “main street” Republicans than they were in 2010 and 2012. A strong set of Republican nominees could give the party as many as a dozen credible opportunities to pick up the seats they need – whereas a weaker series of candidates could require them to win almost all of the races that remained competitive after the primaries.

Click image to enlarge

Senate Immigration Bill Advances; Senator Leahy Files Gay Couples Amendment

Today the so-called "Gang of Eight" immigration reform bill advanced and received a wide thumbs up vote in the U. S. Senate.  Politico describes it this way:

The Senate on Tuesday overwhelmingly agreed to launch a major effort to rewrite U.S. immigration laws, setting the stage for weeks of debate on securing the nation’s borders, legalizing undocumented residents and modernizing the country’s immigration system.

Senators voted 82-15 to move forward on the Gang of Eight immigration bill; 60 votes were needed for passage. All 15 votes against the motion were from Republicans. The bill cleared a second procedural vote later Tuesday.

The overwhelming bipartisan vote gives the Gang of Eight room to negotiate, but finding an acceptable approach to tightening border security is emerging as major challenge for the bipartisan coalition.

Part of the negotiation process will be about including same sex bi-national couples with the same immigration rights as married heterosexual couples.  To make sure this happens, Senator Patrick Leahy filed an amendment for this purpose.  Here are highlights from Politico on the ammendment:

 

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy is trying again on immigration and gay rights.

The Vermont Democrat filed an amendment to the Gang of Eight immigration bill on Tuesday that would allow gay U.S. citizens to petition their foreign spouses to become permanent residents. He had withdrawn the measure after an emotional debate during the committee markup, after several Democrats said they would vote against his amendment in order to preserve the overall bill.

Seeking equal protection under our laws for the LGBT community is the right thing to do,” Leahy said in a statement Tuesday. “I withheld my anti-discrimination amendment during the Senate Judiciary Committee markup. As the entire Senate turns to debate the immigration bill, the fight for equality must go on.”

It is unclear whether Leahy’s proposal will get a vote. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) have yet to reach an agreement on amendments.

And the political dynamics for Leahy’s amendment are different on the floor. In the committee, the amendment would have required just a simple majority for it to pass. On the floor, it will almost certainly need 60 votes.

If Democrats do not support the Leahy amendment, in my view, they need to pay a price in terms of votes and money.  I seem to be on every national level Democrat committee donor mailing list known to man and I am now routinely reply to ask for money with a statement that (i) no money will be forth coming until gays are covered under the immigration reform act and Obama signs an ENDA executive order for federal employees and (ii) please remove me from the mailing list.   The boyfriend and I are supporting state level candidates - a McAuliffe staffer has been living in our home for a month now - but the Democrats at the federal level can kiss my ass until they put blather into actual action.  They don't get it that "support" is a two way street.

A U.S. Senate in the Grip of the Gun Lobby

Today in a shameful act that I find disgusting, the U. S. Senate defeated a bi-partisan authored effort to bring some minimal sanity to America's gun control laws.  The winner today was the NRA and the gun manufacturers for which it constitutes a front organization.  The losers were the nearly 90% of Americans who support background checks and minimal efforts to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and the mentally ill.  It goes without saying that GOP senators led the charge to kill the legislation.  Not surprisingly the families of children massacred at Sandy Hook elementary are outraged.  Similarly outraged is a victim of gun violence herself, former Congresswomen Gabrielle Giffords who has let loose with an op-ed in the New York Times.  The piece deserves a full reading.  Here are highlights:

SENATORS say they fear the N.R.A. and the gun lobby. But I think that fear must be nothing compared to the fear the first graders in Sandy Hook Elementary School felt as their lives ended in a hail of bullets. The fear that those children who survived the massacre must feel every time they remember their teachers stacking them into closets and bathrooms, whispering that they loved them, so that love would be the last thing the students heard if the gunman found them..

On Wednesday, a minority of senators gave into fear and blocked common-sense legislation that would have made it harder for criminals and people with dangerous mental illnesses to get hold of deadly firearms — a bill that could prevent future tragedies like those in Newtown, Conn., Aurora, Colo., Blacksburg, Va., and too many communities to count. 

Some of the senators who voted against the background-check amendments have met with grieving parents whose children were murdered at Sandy Hook, in Newtown. Some of the senators who voted no have also looked into my eyes as I talked about my experience being shot in the head at point-blank range in suburban Tucson two years ago, and expressed sympathy for the 18 other people shot besides me, 6 of whom died. These senators have heard from their constituents — who polls show overwhelmingly favored expanding background checks. And still these senators decided to do nothing. Shame on them. 

We know what we’re going to hear: vague platitudes like “tough vote” and “complicated issue.” I was elected six times to represent southern Arizona, in the State Legislature and then in Congress. I know what a complicated issue is; I know what it feels like to take a tough vote. This was neither. These senators made their decision based on political fear and on cold calculations about the money of special interests like the National Rifle Association, which in the last election cycle spent around $25 million on contributions, lobbying and outside spending. 

Speaking is physically difficult for me. But my feelings are clear: I’m furious. I will not rest until we have righted the wrong these senators have done, and until we have changed our laws so we can look parents in the face and say: We are trying to keep your children safe. We cannot allow the status quo — desperately protected by the gun lobby so that they can make more money by spreading fear and misinformation — to go on.

I am asking every reasonable American to help me tell the truth about the cowardice these senators demonstrated. I am asking for mothers to stop these lawmakers at the grocery store and tell them: You’ve lost my vote. I am asking activists to unsubscribe from these senators’ e-mail lists and to stop giving them money. I’m asking citizens to go to their offices and say: You’ve disappointed me, and there will be consequences. 

Mark my words: if we cannot make our communities safer with the Congress we have now, we will use every means available to make sure we have a different Congress, one that puts communities’ interests ahead of the gun lobby’s. To do nothing while others are in danger is not the American way.

Very well said.

Mitch McConnell's Romney Like Moment

It will not surprise readers that I don't like Mitch McConnell who I view as a nasty, lying sleaze bag most of the time.  Thus it was delicious to see a secret audio tape of a meeting among McConnell and his campaign aids which ridiculed would-be political rival, actress Ashley Judd, and plotted tactics to undermine her, including depicting her as mentally ill.  Thankfully, more of the public will now know just how down and dirty and sleazy McConnell is in fact.  Sadly, he's the typical Republican who talks "values" and integrity yet tosses both out the window in his obsession to retain power.   The Washington Post looks at how Mother Jones scored this second coup and suggests that others may follow.  I find it a good thing that some people are finally disgusted with the GOP's hypocrisy and nastiness and willing to help expose it.  Here are article highlights:

David Corn says one good scoop may have led to another. And might even lead to still others, too.  The Mother Jones magazine reporter and MSNBC pundit was busy Wednesday handling the fallout from, and some fawning over, his latest revelation about a prominent Republican. Corn unearthed the audiotape of a private meeting in which Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and his aides mocked a would-be political rival, the actress Ashley Judd, and plotted tactics to undermine her. An unidentified source leaked the surreptitious recording of the February meeting to Corn.

And just like that, Corn and Mother Jones had their second major bombshell in seven months. The first, of course, was one of the most consequential scoops of the presidential campaign — a leaked video recording of Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney saying at a small fundraiser last May that “47 percent” of voters were “dependent” on the government. (Corn will receive the prestigious Polk Award for Political Reporting for the Romney story on Thursday.)

Corn, 54, says the two career-making stories might have been linked. He guesses that his source on the McConnell recording — whom he won’t reveal — came to him because of the way he handled the Romney recording and the firestorm it ignited.

[I]n the wake of the Romney revelation, Corn has received a mini-flood of would-be audio and video leaks about Washington figures. Some of these have looked promising, but none have become public — yet. Corn said he hasn’t been able to vet them to his satisfaction or work out terms for making them public. He has “passed” on several of the offers for a variety of reasons.

Not so of the McConnell recording, which Corn said he received two weeks ago. He spent several days authenticating it, ensuring that it wasn’t faked, doctored or taken out of context. He tried to get a response from McConnell’s camp a day before publication but received nothing.

Despite ample criticism, including from McConnell, that the audio recording is an invasion of privacy, Corn argues that its newsworthiness trumps those concerns. “I think voters and citizens have a tremendous right to know almost as much as possible of the elected officials who come before them and ask for their votes,” he said. “I think people can decide for themselves how outrageous [McConnell’s] behavior is, but it gives you a glimpse inside his campaign’s thinking.”

“What’s wonderful about this story and ‘47 percent’ story is that no one needs to listen to me or any commentator to know what it means,” he said Wednesday. “It’s all there. It’s journalism verite. You can listen to it and come to your own conclusion. I would encourage people to come forward with more tapes.”

We once saw investigative reporting in the main stream media.  Sadly, the MSM now largely only echos the sound bites of politicians.  Thankfully, Mother Jones and other alternative sources are stepping in to take up the slack.  I want to see more of it.

Gay Couples Will not Be Included in Immigration Reform Bill

The initial draft of the Senate immigration reform bill is not expected to address the plight of bi-national married same sex couples who to date are barred because of DOMA from receiving the same treatment as heterosexual couples who seek to have the non-American spouse given residency in the U.S.A.  If this situation doesn't change, the only hope of these couples may be that DOMA is struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court when it hands down its ruling in United States v. Windsor in June.  The Washington Blade looks at the situation.  Here are some highlights:

Immigration Equality Executive Director Rachel Tiven on Monday said she does not expect same-sex couples will be included in the comprehensive immigration reform bill a bi-partisan group of senators could potentially introduce by the end of the week.

“We are not expecting LGBT families to be included in the Gang of 8 bill,” she told the Washington Blade during a conference call ahead of a rally in support of comprehensive immigration reform on Wednesday that is expected to draw tens of thousands of people to the U.S. Capitol. “That in our minds means that of course the bill is incomplete.”

Tiven’s comments come roughly three months after President Obama publicly unveiled an immigration reform proposal that includes bi-national gay couples. Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano in February told the Senate Judiciary Committee the White House supports a provision that would allow gays and lesbians to sponsor their foreign-born partners for immigration purposes.

Tiven said she remains hopeful members of the Senate Judiciary Committee will revisit the issue once they begin to debate the “Gang of 8” bill.

“We expect and we hope that senators on the committee will allow a full and open amendment process that provides an opportunity to fix the flaws in the base bill of which the exclusion of Uniting American Families Act is one,” she said.

Nadler took a similar tone as he expressed Leahy’s efforts to include UAFA as an amendment to the bill in committee before it reaches the Senate floor.

“I will fight like hell to ensure that LGBT-inclusive language remains in any House and Senate conference report,” Nadler told the Blade. “The ultimate goal is, of course, not how we pass LGBT-inclusive immigration reform, but that we make certain that such a bill lands on the president’s desk.”

 Among those opposing the inclusion of same sex couples are the child rapist protectors of the U. S. Catholic Bishops Conference.

Senate Democrats Jump Into Pro-Gay Marriage Camp

While the Republican Party continues to prostitute itself to the Christofascists and voices of hate and intolerance and clings to an anti-gay agenda, the Democrats see where the polls are trending and the reality that very soon that being anti-gay marriage will be a losing proposition.  While many of these Democrats claim that they have "evolved," I suspect that in many cases - Senator Mark Warner is probably an exception - what has motivated them to suddenly support gay marriage is simply the fact that they see being anti-gay as bad politics as the older anti-gay voters are dying off and being replaced by gay supporting younger voters.  These folks are not profiles in courage by any means.  But, for now, I will accept their support regardless of the true motivation.  A piece in the Washington Post looks at these conversions.  Here are highlights:

In the past month, the rapid rise in public support for same-sex marriage has left Supreme Court justices perplexed and some political veterans, such as Hillary Rodham Clinton, struggling to keep up. 

But there may be no better measure of this historic change and its disorienting speed than what has happened among the Democrats of the U.S. Senate. They are often representatives of an urban party in rural places. That makes them the zebras of Washington’s little world: perpetually vulnerable, sniffing the wind.

As recently as the last election, 17 of those Democrats did not support same-sex marriage. By this week, however, the number was smaller.  And getting more so by the day.

“After much thought and prayer, I have come to my own personal conclusion that we shouldn’t tell people who they can love or who they can marry,” Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.) said Wednesday in a statement posted on her Facebook page.  .  .  .  .   After Hagan, nine Democrats left. And on Wednesday, even that group seemed to show limited enthusiasm for the cause of limiting marriage to unions of one man and one woman.

For many Democrats, support for same-sex marriage no longer seems like an option. It seems like an obligation.  “Many more family members have come forward, whether it’s somebody’s sister, brother, cousin, uncle, mother, father, whatever it is, have come forward as to their interest in marriage equality, and that’s been then translated into our popular culture. . . . So, we’re in a different place,” said House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Wednesday, describing how she’s seen other lawmakers change their opinions.

According to the activist group Human Rights Campaign, 46 of 55 Senate Democrats and independents now support same-sex marriage, compared to last fall, when supporters numbered 36 out of 53.

Is GOP Senator Ted Cruz The New McCarthy?

The descent of the GOP into a political party that knows no shame - or integrity, for that matter - is personified by Senator Ted Cruz (pictured at left) who seems to believe that he is the New Joseph McCarthy.   What's even scarier is that the man even bears a surface physical resemblance to McCarthy at first glance.   With Cruz, lies, innuendo and extremism all go hand in hand.  What is additionally disturbing is that Cruz seemingly thinks the Soviet Union is still in existence and that we are back in the 1950's.  A piece in The New Yorker looks at the latest buffoon/hate merchant out of Texas.  Here are some article highlights:

Last week, Texas Senator Ted Cruz’s prosecutorial style of questioning Chuck Hagel, President Obama’s nominee for Defense Secretary, came so close to innuendo that it raised eyebrows in Congress, even among his Republican colleagues. Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, called Cruz’s inquiry into Hagel’s past associations “out of bounds, quite frankly.” The Times reported that Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, rebuked Cruz for insinuating, without evidence, that Hagel may have collected speaking fees from North Korea. Some Democrats went so far as to liken Cruz, who is a newcomer to the Senate, to a darkly divisive predecessor, Senator Joseph R. McCarthy, whose anti-Communist crusades devolved into infamous witch hunts. Senator Barbara Boxer, a California Democrat, stopped short of invoking McCarthy’s name, but there was no mistaking her allusion

Boxer’s analogy may have been more apt than she realized. Two and a half years ago, Cruz gave a stem-winder of a speech at a Fourth of July weekend political rally in Austin, Texas, in which he accused the Harvard Law School of harboring a dozen Communists on its faculty when he studied there. Cruz attended Harvard Law School from 1992 until 1995. His spokeswoman didn’t respond to a request to discuss the speech.

Cruz made the accusation while speaking to a rapt ballroom audience during a luncheon at a conference called “Defending the American Dream,” sponsored by Americans for Prosperity, a non-profit political organization founded and funded in part by the billionaire industrialist brothers Charles and David Koch.

He then went on to assert that Obama, who attended Harvard Law School four years ahead of him, “would have made a perfect president of Harvard Law School.” The reason, said Cruz, was that, “There were fewer declared Republicans in the faculty when we were there than Communists! There was one Republican. But there were twelve who would say they were Marxists who believed in the Communists overthrowing the United States government.”

“We are puzzled by the Senator’s assertions, as we are unaware of any basis for them,” Robb London, a spokesman for Harvard Law School, told me.  .  .  .  .  Harvard Law School Professor Charles Fried, a Republican who served as Ronald Reagan’s Solicitor General from 1985 to 1989, and who subsequently taught Cruz at the law school, suggests that his former student has his facts wrong.“I can right offhand count four “out” Republicans (including myself) and I don’t know how many closeted Republicans

Fried acknowledged that “there were a certain number (twelve seems to me too high) who were quite radical, but I doubt if any had allegiance or sympathy with anything called ‘the Communists,’ who at that time (unlike the thirties and forties) were in quite bad odor among radical intellectuals.”

Sounding like a disappointed professor, Fried said that Cruz’s willingness to label the faculty Communist “lacks nuance.” He said he remembered Cruz well, as “very bright, very hard-working and very conservative, in a well-mannered, agreeable way.” So he said, “This surprises me. It suggests he’s changed.”  So too, perhaps, has the U.S. Senate.

As I have said so often, ignorance and lies now predominate just as in the Christian Right and Tea Party which now control the GOP.