I want to chime in on these articles, which John Judis notes below, which have U.S. defense officials taking credit for providing intelligence to Ukraine that helped kill Russian generals and sink the ship Moskva. My take on it is somewhat different. But we agree inasmuch as making these comments seems very ill-advised and unhelpful.

A few points.

Washington is abuzz over the question of who leaked the Supreme Court draft overturning Roe v. Wade. I am far more interested in who were the unnamed officials who boasted to The New York Times and Washington Post about the United States’ success in helping Ukraine kill Russian generals and sink that warship. These boasts are beyond impolitic.

Last night, Politico Nightly had a somewhat ungenerous read on Democratic efforts to codify Roe. Congress Editor Elana Schor noted that Democrats are resisting efforts to join a bipartisan effort that is backed by pro-choice Senators Collins and Murkowski. That seems odd. Why wouldn’t they add those votes? The Collins and Murkowski option wouldn’t provide as fulsome protections for abortion access. But it would like get more than 50 votes rather than a vote in the high 40s. It makes the Democrats sound more interested in purity than results. So why not do that? Sen Mazie Hirono explains: since getting to 50 votes actually has no practical impact on passing the law, why not vote on a law you can enthusiastically get behind rather than a more watered down one?

That’s a pretty good logic.

But this logic illustrates the broader dead end the Democrats are walking into. These votes are often called “symbolic” votes. But that’s not an accurate description. Votes like these are test votes to frame electoral choices. You either force the opposition to make unpopular votes with the intention of campaigning on those votes in an election or — more directly — you use the votes to frame a clear electoral choice. So you tell voters, this is what is at stake in this election. Elect us and we will do this thing. As I’ve argued, in this case that means something like, give us two more Democratic senators and the House and we will codify Roe on the first day of the new Congress.