I’ve mentioned several times in recent weeks that it is critical Democrats learn (yet another) lesson of the early Obama years. Good policy doesn’t make for good politics. Not by itself. You have to do the good policy and combine it with good politics. That means many things but the first is effectively telling and reminding voters what you did. With the recent COVID relief bill that means an on-going and robust process of messaging connecting elements of the bill with unfolding events over the next 18 months. You can’t wait until a few months before the election. It has to be consistent throughout. The administration may not be putting Joe Biden’s name on all the relief checks. But it’s essential to do something equivalent to that as vaccines rollout, checks hit people’s bank accounts and more.

With that in mind we did an Inside Briefing earlier this week with Guy Cecil, Chair of PrioritiesUSA, which is now the biggest Dem-affiliated outside group. Any such effort will inevitably fall largely on groups like Priorities. So I wanted to get an understanding of, is this happening? What’s the plan? I found the discussion really informative and helpful so this morning we’re sharing the briefing with all members. You can watch it after the jump.

HR1/S1, the big democracy protection bill Democrats are trying to get through Congress this year, is an absolutely critical piece of legislation. It has three main components: 1) expanding and protecting access to voting 2) clamping down on partisan gerrymandering and 3) campaign finance reform. A portion of campaign finance reform creates a federal public financing system.

And 10 days later: A mass shooting in Boulder, Colorado.

In the wake of the Marjory Stoneman Douglass massacre in 2018, the city of Boulder passed landmark legislation banning the possession of assault weapons and large-capacity magazines within the municipality. The city law was challenged with aggressive legal action from gun-rights activists, including the Colorado State Shooting Association and the local chapter of the National Rifle Association.

Both the politics and the existence of Israel have long been matters of great fascination and importance to me. But my interest, engagement, commitment has ebbed as the country’s politics have become not only more right wing but more consistently absurd over the last decade. The animating question of Israeli politics is no longer the Arab-Israeli conflict, questions of political economy or religion but overwhelmingly the question of one man: Benjamin Netanyahu. He entirely dominates what is called the ‘national camp’ and two or perhaps three of the country’s other parties are right wing parties which are founded around their principal’s personal disputes with Netanyahu. Every few months there’s another election. When Netanyahu wins he becomes Prime Minister. When Netanyahu loses he also becomes Prime Minister. Why pay attention?

Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL) made speculation about his impending bid for retiring Sen. Richard Shelby’s (R-AL) seat official last night with a speech that not-so-subtly revealed that the “Big Lie” would be a crucial pillar of his campaign.

My take on the British monarchy is one of general indifference. They’re quaint. They’ve inspired countless costume dramas I’ve enjoyed immensely. I even have some small element of nostalgia for them in the same way I do for dragons or jousting tournaments. But mostly I don’t care about them in any way. But I’ve been struck by the recent efflorescence of pro-monarchism on the American right, something that seems to flow in this particular case downstream from hostility to Meghan Markle, but is yet part of something larger. In the midst of the Markle drama, Trump immigration czar Stephen Miller hopped on to Twitter to defend the monarchy as a symbol of national service and praise the royals he met during President Trump’s state visit as “unfailingly gracious and deeply committed to preserving the traditions and heritage of the UK.” (emphasis added). A week later The National Review published An American Defense of Britain’s Constitutional Monarchy.

Not really, of course.

Like his fellow GOPers’ efforts to raise awareness surrounding the humanitarian crisis at the border, Cruz’s newfound concern for media access is convenient, to say the least.

One of the oddities or ironies – I’m not sure quite what it is – of the COVID Pandemic is that the US and UK, which did so poorly managing the disease vs much of Europe, have done so much better vaccinating their populations. This shows up particularly for the UK which is mostly relying on the same AstraZeneca as the the EU. Now comes word that the EU may block exports of the vaccine and its constituent ingredients to the UK until the manufacturer meets its delivery obligations to the European Union. (Needless to say, some of the knock on consequences of Brexit.)

It’s been a fear for pro-choice advocates for some time — one that grew when Trump was elected and only accelerated after Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away late last year.

When will reproductive rights be back in front of the Supreme Court?

What’s really going on in Tennessee?