The Formula for Democratic Victories

The ground shook Tuesday in Washington, thanks to an election that was hundreds of miles away. Republican Roy Moore lost the Senate race in Alabama, in an absolute shock to our political system. The truth is that a Democrat should almost never be able to win in Alabama, but this was the exception. Roy Moore was accused of pedophilia, and that was enough to drive him to defeat, even in Alabama.

Do not kid yourself- this was as close as it gets. Democrat Doug Jones was elected to the U.S. Senate by under 21,000 votes (at last look), despite the horrible accusations against Moore. Moore was a weak candidate by Alabama standards, a former judge who won his last race for Chief Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court by a 52–48% margin, which had been the closest statewide race Alabama had seen in over a decade before this one. Even so, the horrible accusations against Roy Moore were only enough to pull him down by 4% from his last race. That’s a flip of one of every twenty-five people.

Even so, Democrats should take heart in a lot of things that came out of Doug Jones’ victory. Jones, and his coalition, were the perfect ideal for Democratic victories. Three things in specific happened to achieve this victory. The first, and biggest piece of why Jones won, was an increased African-American turnout. African-Americans, especially African-American women, are the base of the Democratic Party, and they came through huge, again. Second, just enough of the suburban, college educated white population came to the Democratic side. No one is confusing the college-educated white vote in Alabama for liberal and suddenly becoming a bunch of socialists, but Trump’s fall from 71% in the 2016 Election to just below 50% in exit polls in Alabama on Tuesday suggests that these folks moving away just enough for Democrats to win in 2018. Third, Democrats effectively made the argument to down-scale white voters, particularly non-college educated voters, that Roy Moore did not represent them well, and they showed up at a lower level than they did in 2016. There is no doubt that a completely reprehensible pig like Roy Moore played a huge part in all three of these things happening. Jones deserves some credit though. African-American voters viewed him as credible for his record on Civil Rights, while the white college educated voters around Tuscaloosa, Auburn, and in suburban areas of the state gave him a much better showing than Hillary Clinton got in the state last year.

Democratic statewide tickets this year were balanced both demographically and ideologically. Phil Murphy and Sheila Oliver in New Jersey are both solidly progressives, and yet solidly members of the state’s establishment- Murphy was President Obama’s Ambassador to Germany and Oliver was the former Speaker of the Assembly. Ralph Northam, Justin Fairfax, and Mark Herring all took solidly liberal positions on climate change, the minimum wage, and marriage equality, but had establishment chops that gave them credibility- Northam as Lieutenant Governor, Fairfax in President Obama’s DOJ, and Herring as the sitting Attorney General. Doug Jones was understandably more moderate on a number of issues to run in Alabama, but his time as a U.S. Attorney ended up being the strongest selling point to the Democratic base. This year’s statewide candidates ran as solid Democrats for their states, but they also didn’t run as wild-eyed outsiders.

Democrats need to take the right lessons out of these elections. Americans are not ready to embrace us fighting a new revolution, but they are ready for us to represent the states and districts we are running in, and to lead based on our values and convictions. If we can continue to sell this version of the Democratic Party, and embrace the political values of our actual base, 2018 will be a very good year for Democrats.

The Moving Moral Lines of Big Tobacco's Favorite Senator

I was a teenager when the Starr Report came out, detailing Bill Clinton’s sexual activity in the Oval Office and beyond, and I must admit that like many people my age, I figured out a way to sneak and read it. I fully understood that Bill Clinton, a man older than my father, had an affair with a woman barely older than me, in the White House. I got why people didn’t approve of it, and also why people didn’t want him removed from office at that time. I have to admit that it took me several years to fully process all of it, but even in 1998, I basically got it.

I can imagine that UCLA Law Grad and Philip Morris Counsel Kirsten Gillibrand had a more sophisticated understanding of the issue than I did at the time. Ivy League educated, no one can say she isn’t smart- she is. She was about 30 at that time, so she was certainly old enough to understand the content of the report. She was old enough to defend “big tobacco” at a time when the government was accusing it of spending decades trying to sell it’s product to children, and old enough to make a rational choice- defending this somewhat “dirty” client allowed her to make a great living, and as she defended it, do pro bono work for abused women and tenants seeking safe housing after being exposed to dangerous lead paint. No one can accuse Kirsten Gillibrand of being naive, stupid, or uninformed.

It goes without saying then that I assume Kirsten Gillibrand fully understood the morality of Bill Clinton when she took a job as the Special Counsel to then-HUD Secretary Andrew Cuomo for the final year of the Clinton Administration. Gillibrand clearly comprehended the behavior of President Clinton, and happily took a job in his Administration. I can’t fault her a bit for that.

When Gillibrand left the Clinton Administration, she needed to make more money. She took a job at Boies, Schiller & Flexner, who represented Philip Morris’ parent company. One can presume she used her considerable connections at that point to get into the well-connected law firm. Obviously she had her Philip Morris days, and she had been a donor to Hillary Clinton’s U.S. Senate campaign in 2000- to the tune of $12,000. I bet some phone calls were made on her behalf. Again, I can’t blame her a bit.

Gillibrand wanted to run for public office though, and in 2005 she launched a bid for Congress in the Hudson Valley. Bill Clinton came and campaigned for her twice. Hillary Clinton was a big influence on talking her into the race. I presume that she had not yet forgotten the details of the accusations against President Clinton. She took their help all the way to her 2006 Congressional victory, again in her 2008 victory, and in the process of receiving the Senate appointment to replace Hillary Clinton in 2009. The Clintons were there every step of the way for Gillibrand, and to her credit, she was a supporter of Hillary for President in both 2008 and 2016. No one can blame her for taking the help and support from such a prominent Democratic family in her home state. That’s just smart politics. 

Of course, this is where the story gets messy, and Gillibrand is proven to be as craven and opportunistic as any politician we have seen. Hillary Clinton lost in 2016, and the stock of the Clintons is pretty far down right now. One might argue that a popular Senator like Gillibrand might have more actual political power and pull right now than the Clintons after a bruising defeat in the 2016 Presidential Election, especially with the rise of the “Me Too” movement against sex crimes- something she was fighting about for years. One might also guess that Gillibrand could have some compassion for her former mentors, and not want to pile on them with everyone else, now that they aren’t as useful to her. That’s not the case though.

Now again, no one can claim Kirsten Gillibrand did not know the details of the accusations made against Bill Clinton. She knew when she worked for his Administration, and when she took the aide of the Clintons on her campaigns. Of course she still knew when she said Bill Clinton should have stepped down over the Lewinsky affair last month. None of the facts have changed during the 20 years that have passed since the affair ended in 1997. Gillibrand did not suddenly find the importance of protecting victims of sexual assault- it’s been a leading cause of her career. Presumably though for Gillibrand, she has simply changed her mind on President Clinton since she took a job in his Administration in 2000, or had him come campaign for her in 2006, or campaigned for his wife in 2016. People do change their mind. They usually do so for a reason though- changing facts, for instance- not just because they change their mind, especially on a subject they have always been outspoken though. Her behavior is particularly interesting on this subject, to say the least.

It can be pretty hard to criticize Gillibrand for her calls for Al Franken to resign too. Franken has apologized and admitted wrong-doing, which would seem to make things rather simple. Gillibrand returned the campaign contributions she took from the previously popular Franken right after the accusations against him came out. Gillibrand then became the first Senator to call on Franken to resign. One might say she changed her mind on Franken too, particularly in the several weeks between the first accusation that came out, and her decision to call for his head.

Indeed, Gillibrand seems to change her mind a lot. She worked for Philip Morris, presumably with at least her own tacit approval, but then liked to talk about how she voted against “big tobacco” every time in the U.S. Congress. She was pro-gun when she ran in the Upstate of New York, but now is a champion of gun sense legislation, while still being a member of the “Sportsmen’s Caucus” in the Congress. She was fine with Bill Clinton, until he wasn’t helpful anymore, and she wasn’t fine with him. She was fine with Al Franken’s donations, until she wasn’t fine with him anymore. Gillibrand, like any skilled politician, seems to figure out how the winds are blowing, politically, and move with them. One really shouldn’t fault her for that any more than the other 99 members of the Senate. One also shouldn’t buy her line of bullcrap about morality and doing the right thing though either. Gillibrand went after both Bill Clinton and Al Franken in the past month because she could get positive coverage for doing so, and both are considerably weakened. That’s not exactly some profile in courage.

I could take Kirsten Gillibrand’s moral leadership seriously if it wasn’t so transparently political- I think we all know that most of these types of crusades are political, but at least they don’t seem so nakedly opportunistic, usually. She’s not the first, she certainly won’t be the last, but can we at least stop pretending there’s honor in her current actions? Just over a year ago, in writing about why she supported Hillary Clinton, Gillibrand wrote:

“It was just a few years later that my husband Jonathan and I moved back to the Albany area, where I grew up, to prepare for my own run for office. I was lucky enough to receive guidance and mentorship from Hillary during that run, and was truly honored that President Bill Clinton campaigned for me in my first run for Congress in 2006.”

I get it, that’s supporting Hillary, not Bill. All I want to know from Senator Gillibrand is this though: is she still truly honored that President Bill Clinton, who she apparently feels disgraced the White House enough that he should have resigned, campaigned for her in her first run for Congress in 2006?

I would love to hear the verbal gymnastics she’d engage in to spin that one now.

John Lennon

On this night, 36 years ago, John Lennon was pronounced dead to the world, during a Monday Night Football game. He was shot in the arch of the Dakota, along Central Park by Mark David Chapman. Chapman’s motive has been said to be “wanting to be somebody,” “Catcher in the Rye,” and insanity- and it’s possible all of the above are true.

I’m not a huge Beatles fan, I’m more of a Rolling Stones guy. I’m a John Lennon fan though. I find his solo music to have more of an edge than most of his work with the Beatles, and I just tend to like him more on his own. Like most of his fans, I love “Imagine,” but if I were really pinpointing my favorite Lennon works, I’d probably go with “God,” “Merry Christmas,” and “Instant Karma,” while probably adding “Revolution” from his Beatles days. I find his lyrics to be at least as powerful as his music, and a big reason for why I’m a fan.

There is a John Lennon song for just about all of my political values, the only such artist I could say that to. “Imagine” would define my early political beliefs and thoughts, when I became politicized by my opposition to the Iraq War. “God” would define his, and my, rejection of -isms and dogma, a great rejection of the ideologies of the 20th century. “Revolution” would define my disdain for false revolutionaries and people who want to be fake radicals. Lennon seems to have a song to speak to each of my thoughts.

The John Lennon I came to find was an acquired taste. My parents are big Lennon fans, but unlike their love of the Stones, I didn’t inherit it naturally. I didn’t really listen to the Beatles or Lennon as a kid, and only really got into Lennon’s work when I was in high school. In college I started reading about Lennon the man, and found him compelling. His message of peace was simple, yet compelling. I’d like to think I would be a supporter, but some days I don’t know. His activism put him in the cross-hairs of Richard Nixon and other “establishment” figures who found him dangerous. The break-up of the Beatles perplexed me. I wondered how anyone dealt with the constant attention he lived with for his entire adult life. His relationship to Yoko always seemed so much more complicated than most other relationships, at least when I was younger. Lennon just flat out fascinated me.

I’m now old enough to understand and analyze Lennon as a person, and the only conclusion I can come to is that I wish we had someone like him today. He was larger than life, and yet willing to engage his world for it’s betterment. He was a passionate activist, and yet far more realistic than most other passionate activists. He had downfalls and demons, and yet was able to be “good.” He was an actual person, and yet had the ability to do so much more than most of us.

I hope at some point in the coming days to go visit Strawberry Fields, one of my favorite places in the world. I’ll say a quiet prayer in his memory while I’m there.

No, Not Me, Not This Time

I’ve spent most of my adult life electing women to public office. I worked for Hillary, I worked for the first African-American Congresswoman in New Jersey history, the first Bosnian woman to serve in a state legislature, several female statewide judges, and many female state legislators. I don’t do so because of some deep desire to elect women- I do so because I generally do think women do a better job in public office for the values and issues that I care about. I think they bring a better life perspective and experiences to the table, and frankly I think they don’t worry about some of the idiotic political issues that men do as much (for example, having their gun to fight the government.). Women are way under represented in public office, and should at least be occupying enough offices to match their ration in society (women are a slight majority).

Yet, here I found myself yesterday arguing with many people I have called allies and friends- over Al Franken’s resignation. Despite the views of some, the argument isn’t over what Franken did, it is over what should have been done about it. Al Franken admitted wrong-doing, there is no argument there. Al Franken deserves to be punished for that, there is no argument there. I find myself incapable of supporting the actions of the twenty-some Democratic Senators who pushed Franken out though.

My chief issue with all of this was the rush to circumvent due process. Al Franken admitted some things, but not others. He was referred to the Senate Ethics Committee, the body that is supposed to deal with Senate behavioral issues. That body would be able to establish facts, and decide the appropriate punishment for what Franken actually did do. There are some who say this is a moral issue, and that due process should come secondary- those people obviously don’t believe in the U.S. Constitution. That line of thinking has been used in the past to justify all sorts of abuses of justice in this nation, particularly in the Jim Crow South. We’re better than this. We circumvented the Senate Ethics Committee here and had a trial by an angry lynch-mob. A year from now we’ll be disappointed in ourselves, I hope.

The secondary issue with this of course is the question of whether or not the punishment for Al Franken is appropriate- should he have been forced out of the Senate? No one is disputing whether or not he did wrong in the first place, but does he deserve essentially the same punishment as we are calling for on Roy Moore? How about Congressman Conyers, who sexually harassed an employee, creating a hostile work place setting for her, then settled using our tax dollars? How about Trent Franks, asking female staffers to have children with him, “the natural way?” Not all of these cases are the same, morally or legally. There is a real question whether Franken would even have been charged with a crime had his accusers went to the police, while I think any decent person agrees that Roy Moore belongs in jail. Again, Franken deserves punishment, and the Senate Ethics Committee would have many options for how to publicly admonish the Senator after reviewing the facts, everything from written rebuke up to expulsion. Democrats should have lived up to our values- that every offense deserves a fair hearing- and let the process play out.

What will Democrats get for this whole display? A cookie? A medal? Oh, no wait, the moral high ground. You know, “they go low, we go high,” as Michelle Obama told us in 2016. The problem with that is that there is no moral high ground in politics, the vast majority of America doesn’t really love any party. The other problem with that, of course, is that we followed Michelle’s advise in 2016, and we lost to Donald Trump. For their efforts, the Democratic Party will get to defend not one, but two Senate seats in Minnesota in 2018, a state that really isn’t all that blue. Hillary won the state by 44,000 votes in 2016. The state legislature is narrowly divided. Franken’s predecessor was Republican, and Franken won by a margin so narrow that he wasn’t seated for months because of litigation and re-counts. If this state is “safely blue,” I’m not sure how. Democrats will have to spend millions of dollars on this defense that they asked for themselves, millions of dollars that will not go to races in Nevada, Arizona, Texas, and Tennessee- three difficult states where we need three pick-ups to win the U.S. Senate back and stop Trump from appointing dozens more of Federal Judges, or passing horrible tax bills, or selling off our public land (just to name this week’s offenses). Strategy should not be the only factor in making a decision such as the Franken one, but it should not be a forgotten one. The chances of Democrats winning back the Senate may have just went from slim to none with this decision. Meanwhile, the GOP will seat Roy Moore after his victory on Tuesday, and not lose an hour’s sleep because of it. You might say “I don’t want to be like them,” but that’s cold comfort to the sick child who just lost his health insurance under CHIP, or the graduate student facing a tax increase, or the DREAMer who is going to be deported by Donald Trump. Democrats could benefit from being a bit more cut-throat, for the sake of their constituents.

I get it- Al Franken did bad stuff, he made himself politically inconvenient. Some certain Senators who I won’t name here gained national exposure and look like a real “warrior for the cause” by being out in front of the microphone burying Al Franken, kind of like they did in burying Bill Clinton recently. Capitol Hill runs on the “herd mentality,” and once the calls for Franken’s resignation began, there was no going back. It was easier to just get him off stage, so Democrats could avoid hypocrisy charges when they start attacking Senate Republicans for seating Roy Moore next week, which they think is a winning strategy for 2018 (I am not sold on that). So, of course Al Franken had to go.

I think many Democrats hope that pushing Franken out the door will force Republicans to take a long, hard look at Donald Trump, Clarence Thomas, and Roy Moore- but it won’t. Republicans will throw the politically expedient ones to the wolves too, the Trent Franks types, but that will be the end of it. Perhaps that’s good enough for you, and if it is, have a great day. I’m very uncomfortable with the precedent, the morality, and the politics here though, and for that reason, I have to say that throwing Al Franken out of the Senate was a very bad thing- for the Democrats.

The Donald Trump Legacy Project

We need more tax brackets, not less. Someone making $1 million a year pays the same rate as someone paying $250,000- or a small business that is somewhere in between. Nevertheless, the worst experiment in modern state government history- Kansas horrible tax cut plan- is becoming very close to national policy. We’ve seen how terrible it went in Kansas, and of course Donald Trump, Paul Ryan, and Mitch McConnell are about to make it happen for the rest of us. In their simpleton world where tax cuts for the rich and corporations will cause job creation, they argue that just giving more money to rich people will cause them to hire more employees- it will not. The CEOs who were asked all say the same thing- this will be passed on to shareholders and themselves, not to hiring more workers to make a product for whom demand will not rise. Even so, the Republicans will also take an ax to the inheritance tax- ending it for people who have money like Donald Trump. They’ll lower corporate tax rates- which would be a great idea, if anyone actually paid the real corporate tax rate, not the effective one. Worse yet, they’re raising taxes on the poor and middle class- those that could increase demand. The tax bill raises the debt by more than $1 trillion, after years of hearing about how bad deficits are from Republicans. Finally, the bill does not pay for itself- even under the Republican-backed “dynamic scoring” that takes into account their fairy tale beliefs about the effects of tax cuts. The bill is terrible. The bill is a giant giveaway of money for the rich, that leaves us with a huge deficit.

But that’s not the bad part.

The bill will kill the individual mandate portion of the Affordable Care Act, removing any requirement to insure yourself that was created under Obamacare. This change will cause a sizable portion of those insured under the program to drop their coverage. This will throw uncertainty into the insurance market, and cause insurers to raise rates. These rate increases will make health insurance too expensive for millions of those buying individual coverage, and cause millions of people to lose their health insurance. Some 13 million are estimated to lose their health care under this plan.

That’s not the worst part.

This tax bill will also make deep cuts to Medicare and Medicaid, under the cover of deficits, and harm millions of seniors, children, and the poor. Next year alone, Medicare would face a $25 billion cut, and that would continue- automatically- as long as there are deficits in excess of the allowed $1.5 trillion in the next decade. They would be automatic, and no one would even have to raise a finger to do them. The largest beneficiary of these programs are seniors, people who aren’t really in the workforce anymore. 

Now we’re getting to the bad part.

Under the guise of reigning in deficits, this bill will probably have automatic cuts triggered, beyond what already exists, to off-set revenue losses from the tax cut. What that means is pretty straight forward- yes, the tax cut will be unevenly distributed to the rich; yes, the tax cut will grow the deficit anyway. Yes, the tax cut bill will cause 13 million less people to have health insurance; Yes, the bill will cause cuts to Medicare and Medicaid, hurting seniors, children, and the poor; And yes, the bill will hamper the government’s ability to do anything. The Republican Congress and Donald Trump will reward their rich cronies, gut the government’s role in health care, slash what services the government can provide, and ultimately deny the revenue to future governments to do anything more. The long-term implications are more for the have’s and less for the have not’s. 

This is in line with what Donald Trump has done in his first year. 

While we have all derided his incompetency and lack of understanding of his job, his government has done lots of lasting damage. Net neutrality will soon die, changing the face of the internet forever, thanks to his appointment of Ajit Pai and a conservative FCC. He is packing the courts with very young, very inexperienced, very conservative judges, who will have lifetime appointments to the bench. He is not filling key positions in the State Department, and other departments, crippling their effectiveness and changing how they run. His conservative allies are consolidating the television, newspaper, and radio markets under fewer and fewer (conservative) owners. He’s shedding national park land and opening up more of our wild lands to drilling and other environmentally unfriendly things. He’s pulling out of things like the Paris Climate Agreement, which both hampers the human race’s ability to fight climate change, and kills our credibility abroad to work with our allies. He’s putting a Fed Chief in Janet Yellen’s place who will be far more friendly to his views on the economy. 

In short, Trump is doing his damage specifically in ways that will take years (if ever) to get out of the holes he is causing. Even if he were impeached tomorrow and replaced by a competent, progressive President (not possible), they wouldn’t even be able to start in on a progressive agenda for the country- they’d have to clean up the mess first.

Laugh as we may- the Trump legacy project is full-speed ahead.