When a party suffers a major setback, everyone comes forward with their diagnosis of the problem. And in most cases their diagnosis of the problem tells us that the solution is what the diagnoser wanted to do more of in the first place. This is just human nature. We see the evidence before us as confirmation of what we already thought. When I’m asked these kinds of questions, what I always say is that we should be highly skeptical of anything that suggests the answer is obvious or simple to execute. Because for all the groupthink and folly and insular thinking of political professionals, they’re generally fairly bright and they have huge personal and professional incentives to win. If it were really that obvious, someone would have tried it already.
It’s looking like the conservatives on the Supreme Court won’t let anything stand in their way when it comes to gutting Obamacare. And they may have the votes to finally do it.
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Like I said, the immigration executive order is why they impeach the President over. Now they’re saying it.
In case you missed it, my take on the real challenge facing Democrats, which is getting almost no discussion after last Tuesday’s drubbing.
Yesterday I discussed the seemingly intractable problem of wage stagnation for the great majority of Americans. This article looks at a different dimension of the problem, or what for some is the solution: how those with sufficient education are escaping the wealth gap by fleeing struggling towns for more economically vibrant cities.
That New York doctor who came down with Ebola after returning from West Africa now has a clean bill of health and is being – properly – lauded as a hero by the Mayor.
One reason the GOP is making so much noise about the surprise climate change deal with China is that the lack of action by China has long been a central line of attack on any US efforts to take action on carbon emissions. So long as China wasn’t moving, what difference would it make if the US moved, other than to further disadvantage US business? At least that’s how the GOP argument went.
Climate Desk has a great reel up showing just how prevalent this line of attack was from Republicans.
We’ve known for decades that the FBI waged a campaign of harassment against Martin Luther King which culminated in attempts to goad him to commit suicide or face public revelations about sexual liaisons the Bureau had uncovered through pervasive surveillance. We’ve also known for years that there was a 1964 letter to King leveling this threat. Until now though we’ve known about the letter but only in a highly redacted form. Now the full letter is available. Jarring but important to see.
Man points rifle at teen daughter after game of Battleship goes wrong. “The girl tried to leave the trailer where they were playing, but the man dragged her back by her hair and pointed the loaded rifle at her head.”