At an interview today with The Washington Post, Newt Gingrich said that if the Democrats subpoena the President’s tax returns “we’ll see whether or not the Kavanaugh fight was worth it.”

In other words, he made the loyalty oath. He’s the President’s man. Video after the jump. Read More

Yesterday I explained that the media narrative about a GOP comeback in the midterms has very little backing in any hard data that is available. That’s basically still the case. There’s been a bit more wobbliness in the polling numbers than I’d like to see in the last 24 hours. But that still basically applies.

But there’s another side of the story. While this is happening you’re also seeing the GOP parachute big ad buys into a number of races that had seemed pretty solid for Republicans only a few weeks ago. Cam Joseph has a rundown here of some of those late breaking battlegrounds. Interestingly, one of those is Karen Handel, in Georgia’s 6th district, the one who won that big special election back in early 2017.

Also of interest. This afternoon the Cook Political report released a big House battleground poll which includes a lot of interesting information. This is more of a deep dive on the battle for the House rather than the absolutely most recent numbers. It was conducted October 10th-19th. But lots of interesting data. Here’s the results memo.

I’ll be doing an Inside Q&A about the midterms tomorrow at 1 PM eastern. You can find information about subscribing here.

Pretty clear emerging theme from the White House: CNN brought it on itself. Sanders says CNN calls Trump and his supporters “evil” “day-in, day-out.” Sanders attacks CNN for “chos[ing] to attack and divide” in aftermath of bombs. Trump attacks the media, says “Mainstream Media must clean up its act FAST!”

I have mentioned several times in recent days my anxiety about the election less than two weeks from now, one that is caused less by my sense of the likely outcome than the gravity of the stakes involved. This morning, as authorities are still finding new bombs sent to a growing list of Trump targets, President Trump went on Twitter not only to blame the media for the climate of anger and violence but to issue what can, in the climate of the bomb scares, only be deemed a threat. “It has gotten so bad and hateful that it is beyond description. Mainstream Media must clean up its act, FAST!” Read More

It’s part of the human condition that anger builds on itself and leads, sometimes, to violence. But so much of the public dialog at the moment returns to this concept of ‘civility’. You’ve got pro- and anti-civility folks. You’ve got critiques of ‘civility’ as the wrapper into which we package hierarchy and deference. Characterologically, for better or worse, I tend to be pro-civility. I don’t really like seeing people accosted or shouted at in restaurants. But I think we can settle on a simpler point. Civility has relatively little to do with political violence or the kind of totalizing and dehumanizing political rhetoric and action that spawns it. Read More

The pipe bomb sent to CNN has on it a mock ISIS flag that is part of an Internet meme that has been prevalent on far-right sites and message boards since 2014. This NBC News story explains the backstory. It started on a rightwing parody run by a guy who’s a frequent commentator on Breitbart and The Daily Caller and got kicked off Twitter in 2017. Not exactly surprising. Just another bit of confirmation that the bomber is someone from the pro-Trump, 4Chan, alt-right hate world.

The Hollywood Reporter reports tonight that CAA, the Hollywood mega-agency, has dropped Megyn Kelly as a client. Normally this isn’t the sort of news we’d take much notice of. But it’s a good barometer of the degree to which she’s quickly become radioactive in the entertainment and quasi-news world after her blackface comments. NBC News Chief Andy Lack blasted her in a NBC News staff town hall today. They are apparently already negotiating the end of her morning show, which – critically – simply hasn’t done very well. Read More

I’ve added some new names to my Twitter list of polling and election data experts. If you’re interested you can subscribe to it here.

We’re now getting an overall view of the range of targets who were sent explosive devices. We also have a list of false alarms. (John Light has a quick rundown here.) The gist is the Clintons, Obamas, George Soros, Eric Holder, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, Maxine Waters and John Brennan. Brennan’s was actually the name on the device sent to CNN’s offices in New York. The common denominator here is pretty clear. These are not only Democrats or people generally on the left. In Brennan’s case he’s not really clearly either. These are all high profile targets of President Trump and relatedly nemeses of your standard Trumpite media outlets like Breitbart and The Daily Caller. Read More