OUR DYSFUNCTIONAL SENATE

 The minimum wage was last increased federally in two thousand and nine, from five dollars and fifty five cents to seven dollars and twenty five cents.  For years now there has been a movement to raise that amount to fifteen dollars.  While some conservatives have claimed that this could be job killer, job growth was healthy in the years following the last increase.  More importantly, a decent minimum wage would mean that no American citizen who works full time would have to live in poverty, which seems like common sense to me.  And, according to a Pew research poll, a whopping sixty seven percent of the American public  (including a majority of Republicans) agree with me.

Despite that, yesterday the minimum wage increase (and the will of the people) took a big blow in the Senate.  Why?  Because the arcane rules there state that a filibuster (and the sixty votes it requires to break it) can be avoided and a straight majority can pass a bill through something called  reconciliation.  But that bill can only be passed if all the elements of it will have an impact on federal spending or revenue in some way.  (This was how the Republicans were able to pass an unpopular tax break without any Democratic support in  twenty seventeen).   To make things even more complicated, a ruling has to be made about whether a certain part of the bill qualifies as part of reconciliation.  The person making that ruling is called the Senate parliamentarian,  who is appointed by the Senate Majority Leader.  Our current parliamentarian is Elizabeth MacDonough, who has served since two thousand and twelve.  Yesterday she ruled that the minimum wage increase included in the stimulus bill that President Joe Biden has guided through congress does not qualify for reconciliation, essentially killing it.

In other words, we have a branch of our government in which an unelected person can kill an important part of legislation without any system in place to overrule or change that decision.  Furthermore, the only reason that that person has so much power in the first place is to avoid the use of the filibuster by any member of the Senate that opposes that legislation.  So, in an alleged democracy, we have a law that is supported by the American public, a majority of both houses of congress and the White House, thwarted through the  ridiculous system of our  Senate that gives far too much power to individual members (and one appointed parliamentarian).  An increase in the minimum wage is not only popular, it would improve the lives of tens of millions of Americans.  And yet it has been sunk by the ridiculous rules of the Senate. Is there any wonder that so many Americans are cynical about congress when so little can get done?

The obvious answer here is to finally put a stake in the filibuster (which, as I always mention when writing about it, is not in the Constitution).  Unfortunately that does not appear likely in that a majority of the Senate has to vote to remove it, and the Democrats have the barest of majorities, without any room for dissension.  And Senator Joe Manchin  of  West Virginia, the most conservative Democrat in the Senate, has stated that he will not vote to end it.  So it appears that for now the change killing filibuster will remain.  

Although Biden will still be able be able to get most of what he wants in the stimulus bill before he signs it, the excision of one of the most popular parts of the bill just shows how intractable our congressional system has become.  And with the filibuster still around, it will be hard for him to get much done in the upcoming years, (although reconciliation can be used three times a year).  Yes until the filibuster is removed, gridlock remains the main word describing our political system. And things like the minimum wage increase, along with other logical changes like statehood for Puerto Rico and Washington DC, will have to wait.  It's a shame.

LIMBAUGH RIP?

 Today, at the age of seventy, radio personality Rush Limbaugh died of lung cancer.  In many ways, his passing just after Donald Trump exited the White House has a certain perfect symmetry to it; Limbaugh's rambling, hate mongering broadcasts over the years primed a right wing audience for Trump's similarly rambling, hate mongering speeches. And even before Trump, Limbaugh paved the way for the entire right wing media, showing that there was audience for a combination of bigotry, bullying and conspiracy theories.  From Fox News to Qanon,   Limbaugh influenced them all.

While I have always found Limbaugh's politics abhorrent, as an outspoken opponent of the death penalty, it would be hypocritical for me to say that I take any pleasure in his passing.  But I feel no sadness, not just because I think that he was a misogynistic bigot, but also because of the terrible behavior he has promoted over the years.  I'm talking about his advocating for cigar smoking.

Limbaugh has continually promoted cigar  smoking on his show; often he would praise the joys of a "good" cigar, and in most of his promotional photos he would be holding one.  One time on his show he even flat out lied and said that the dangers of tobacco were being overhyped and it wasn't dangerous at all.  This may have had more to do with the fact that tobacco companies tended to make more contributions to the Republicans than to the Democrats than his own personal enjoyment.  

Either way, this was a man who broadcasted for decades to  millions of people.  How many of those people started smoking or decided not to quit because they listened to him?  How many children heard him talking about the joys of cigar smoking and decided to try it?  When you are a media figure that influences millions of people (many of whom proudly proclaimed themselves "ditto heads") isn't it wildly irresponsible to promote something as unhealthy as smoking?  The Center for Disease Control estimates that almost five hundred thousand people die every year from smoking in this country.  How many of those people were fans of Limbaugh?

When you combine his promotion of cigar smoking with his similarly deplorable comments about the coronavirus (which he said was no worse than the common cold, even as it was ravaging the country) it's clear that this man openly endorsed dangerous behaviors.  Politics aside, he had blood on his hands.

THE IMPORTANCE OF IMPEACHMENT

 

Today, Donald Trump, a man who has been accused of sexual assault or rape by twenty six different women, and who has spent his life bouncing from one failed business or bankruptcy to another, while somehow retaining an image as a smart businessman, avoided punishment once again. Yes, the most corrupt, lazy and incompetent president ever still has enough power in his party, even when he's no longer in office, to scare Republican Senators out of doing the right thing and impeaching him.

Sadly, Trump's acquittal was a foregone conclusion, with most Republican Senators  dismissing the charges against him even before the proceedings began.  Some of them even made a point of ignoring the trial while it was taking place.  This is all upsetting, as the Democrats case against Trump had been made so strongly, with numerous video clips and maps showing how much worse the capitol riot could have been, and how complicit Trump was in inspiring the rioters.  

On the plus side, the final vote was fifty seven in favor, forty three against (with sixty seven votes needed to impeach), showing that at least some Republicans were willing to stand up to their former president.  In fact, this impeachment vote was the most bipartisan in American history.  And in an oddly surreal moment, Republican Senate Minority leader Mitch McConnell voted against impeachment, and then gave an address in which he made a blistering attack against Trump, saying that “There’s no question, none, that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day.”  He also added   “He did not do his job. He did not take steps so federal law could be faithfully executed and order restored. No, instead, according to public reports, he watched television happily, happily, as the chaos unfolded.”  Despite his harsh words, McConnell really showed the cowardice that the entire Republican party has shown ever since Trump first started his campaign in twenty fifteen.  With every racist comment, every offensive tweet, every violation of any rule of common decency, McConnell and the rest of his party have ignored, shrugged off or explained away everything Trump has done, when they aren't praising him. While I agree with McConnell's words in his address, his vote was still deplorable.  He could have held Trump responsible, and he chose not to.

So was the impeachment trial a big waste of time?  Not at all.  Even if Trump emerged seemingly unscathed, it's hard for most Americans who aren't under his spell to not see how terrible his behavior has been.  Even as he brags about how he won again, his standing in both his party and the country in general should take a hit.

More importantly, this trial was being made to mark a historical record of an unprecedented time in our country.  Although the entire Trump ordeal has been horrible, it has been his behavior in the past few months, after the election was truly over, that has been so despicable.  Never before has any president ever contested an election that he lost.  Never before has any president said so often and so forcefully that the election was somehow unfair.  Trump's short attention span saw him flit from one outrageous lie to another, from the voting machines being rigged to massive illegal voting.  And when his ball of lies inspired a violent riot, a riot that resulted in the death of five people and the injuring of dozens of others, it was imperative of congress to make a case against him, even when he was out of office, to clearly show that America can not allow any person, even the president, from trying to dismantle democracy for their own gain.

It is important to remember that everything said in the impeachment trial will be entered into a permanent historical record.  Trump's speeches, the actions of the mob, Trump's failure to respond, everything.  Hopefully, the trial will be studied as a cautionary tale of what can happen to a democracy when an autocratic leader who refuses to play by the rules is in charge.  America must never have another Trump like president, and this impeachment trial may play a role in preventing that.  And that's no waste of time.

LEARNING FROM TRUMP?

 

Although he lost the twenty twenty election, Donald Trump did get more votes than his first run in twenty sixteen, and he did not do as poorly as most polls predicted.  Amazingly, he actually increased his numbers in non white voters.  There are a number of theories about why that happened, but the one I find most interesting is the simplest: when the first round of stimulus checks were sent out in the beginning of the pandemic, Trump's name was on the bottom of each check in big bold letters.  For voters who don't follow the news much, seeing that name with that check gave them a positive feeling towards Trump, who was, predictably, taking sole credit for something that was accomplished by a bipartisan group of congress people passing a bill before he signed it.  That positive feeling may have been what led to more votes for Trump in twenty twenty.

This kind of grandstanding was nothing new for our former president (who would've taken credit for the sun coming up each  morning if he could).  But the ability (and willingness) to blow one's own horn is a skill a lot of Democrats could do well to learn from him.

Back in two thousand and nine, shortly after Barack Obama took office, he passed a stimulus bill to help pull the country out of a recession he had inherited.  One of the provisions of the bill was that ordinary workers were refunded a small amount of money in their paychecks.  The theory from the administration was that it was better to give workers a small amount per paycheck rather than a lump sum.  The problem from a political standpoint  was that most workers didn't notice the increase, and the Obama administration got no credit for it.  Even worse, when the stimulus spending brought factory and business openings, there was little to no acknowledgement of how the stimulus money made that possible.  No signs pronouncing that this was what the stimulus was all about, or even a picture of the president to hold up at the ribbon cutting ceremonies.  When  Solyndra, a solar panel company, got stimulus money and then went bankrupt, the Republicans were quick to point out the wasted money.  But why didn't the Democrats respond by showing just how much good the stimulus did?  While many economists now think that the Obama stimulus bill should have been bigger, it did succeed in helping to lift the economy out of the recession it was in.  But Obama and the Democrats got little credit for it, and their perceived failure to fix the economy was part of why the Republican party did so well in the twenty ten midterms.  When the stimulus plan passed congress, there were only a handful of Republican house members that voted for it, and zero members in the Senate.  So the Republican party did nothing to help the economy, and then benefited from the perception that the Democrats didn't do enough!

Here are some other relevant facts: most Americans are pro choice, support gay marriage, believe that climate change is real and something needs to be done about it, think that the rich don't pay their fair share  in taxes and that marijuana should be legal.  Add to that a recent New York Times article that pointed out that  since the year nineteen thirty three, economic growth under Democratic presidents has always, on average, exceeded that of economic growth under Republican ones.  So on the issues, most Americans side with the Democrats, and Democratic presidents have stronger economic growth.

Given all of that, why is it that Republicans ever win elections?  Partly because they know how to work the system, how to use gerrymandering, voter suppression and the electoral college to gain an unfair advantage.  Also, there's a right wing media that mostly ignores big issues to focus on smaller, cultural ones to anger their audience (like the so called "war on Christmas").  But I think another reason is that Republicans are just more openly boastful about successes (or perceived ones), than the Democrats are.  Although I don't want the Democrats to swagger like Donald Trump and George W Bush, a little more bragging about what they've done right wouldn't hurt.

Which brings us to Joe Biden's stimulus plan; unlike Obama, Biden is not spending as much time negotiating with the Republicans, seeing as how he remembers how Obama's attempt at bipartisanship resulted in a weak bill that the Republicans still didn't like.  The important thing is that when that Biden bill is passed and helps the economy get back on track (which most economists think it will), he and his party should not be afraid to take credit where credit is due in the twenty twenty-two midterms.  The public should be reminded that is was Republicans in the White House and congress who botched the pandemic response and the economic fall out it caused and that it was Democrats who helped turn the country around.  And yes, go ahead and put Biden's name at the bottom of the stimulus checks.  He's earned it. 

END THE FILIBUSTER

 So Joe Biden enters the White House with the wind at his back; oh sure, he's got a lot of work to do, like dealing with the effects of the coronavirus on both human lives and the economy, but still,  his approval rating is over fifty percent and his party now controls the House and the Senate as well as the White House.  And Biden hit the ground running, using the power of Presidential order to make big changes on things like immigration and climate change right away.  So far so good.  Perhaps undoing the horrid years of the Trump administration won't be so hard.

And then, reality struck.  Right now the Senate is basically in a state of limbo, with Minority Leader Mitch McConnell demanding that Democrats promise not to get rid of the filibuster before the session begins.  The filibuster is, of course, the rule that allows any member of the Senate to change the number needed for a bill or nomination to pass the Senate from a simple majority to  sixty.  And there is a big difference in that chamber between fifty one votes and sixty.  There's a reason why McConnell is fighting so hard for to keep it; he remembers how effectively he and other Republicans in the Senate used it to slow down the changes that the Obama administration was trying to make back in two thousand and eight (and in a burst of successful cynicism, used their use of gridlock to make Obama look ineffectual in the midterms!).  

But the Democrats remember two thousand and eight too, and they are not thrilled at the prospect of constant filibusters again.  While they are not necessarily saying that they will get rid of it, they want to at least retain the possibility of ending it as a bargaining chip.  Just how long this standoff will last is unknown, but McConnell is a man who clearly like getting his way.  Remember that he held up  Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland  for ten months before the twenty sixteen election, and then rammed through Amy Coney Barrett to that same court less than a month before the twenty twenty election.  Another problem is that not all the Democrats are united behind ending the filibuster, with Senator Joe Manchin III of West Virginia coming out against ending it.

That's a pity.  I've already blogged about how insane I think the filibuster is, and it bears repeating: it's not in the constitution, it has a sorry history of holding up civil rights legislation, and it give far too much power to individual members of the Senate.  Really, it seems like common sense that a piece of legislation passed by majorities of the House and the Senate and supported by the President should be passed, but the filibuster can kill it anyway.

 I think the US Senate is already a chamber that gives far too much power to small states (California, with thirty five million people, has only as many Senators as Rhode Island, which has just over a million people living in it), eliminating the Filibuster is one way that it can become more reflective of the nation at large.  I also think that Puerto Rico and Washington DC should  become states.  But that's another argument.

SOME CHANGES NEED TO BE MADE

 

Now that the disgraceful Trump administration is about to end with Donald Trump being the first president to lose the popular vote twice, while also getting impeached twice, and never having an approval rating over fifty percent, while also  joining the club of one term presidents (he's the eleventh), it's time to look back at some of the shameful, unprecedented behavior that he got away with and make some changes so that no equally corrupt president can ever hold the White House again.

#1. All presidential candidates must release their tax returns- This right from the start corruption was classic Trump.  Every presidential candidate  in modern history before him released their tax returns.  But there was no hard fast rule about it, it was just an assumption.  One that Trump predictably ignored, first lying about releasing them after an audit, and then just never doing it.  It is essential to the American political system that a president should never have possible conflicts of interest regarding their own finances and their policies.  Trump tax returns may eventually be outed by the legal and financial issues he's going to face once he's out of the White House, but that's far too late.  Congress should pass a law mandating this common sense rule as soon as possible.

#2.  All business holdings by an elected president should be placed in a blind trust while he or she is in the White House.  The Emoluments Clause of the Constitution specifically  bars members of the federal government from receiving gifts, emoluments, offices or titles from foreign states and monarchies.  Jimmy Carter put his businesses in a blind trust after he won the white house in nineteen seventy six.  Mitt Romney pledged to do the same if he had won in two thousand and twelve. Trump, on the other hand, just said that he would hand over control of his global business to his two sons, an absurd compromise if there ever was one.  The worst aspect of this was the Trump Hotel in Washington DC continued to operate, meaning that visiting foreign dignitaries could stay and run up huge hotel bills as a way to influence the president.  Again, congress should pass  a law ending violations like this.

#3.  No president should be allowed to pardon family members, or promise pardons to people he has encouraged to break the law.  Because the presidential pardon power is a power that is  irrevocable, Trump has clearly enjoyed wielding it like a king.  This has lead to some obvious grey areas, like pardoning his son in law's father, and some outright corrupt areas, like pardoning Roger Stone, who committed crimes on Trump's behalf.  While Trump has rightfully released a few non violent drug users, for the most part he has used the pardon power as another way to see what he could get away with, pushing the office of the presidency deeper into corruption.  There are even some reports that Rudy Giuliani was recently selling pardons on his behalf!  Limits must be put on this presidential power.

#4.  The president should not allowed to use a nuclear weapon on any country that has not used one on us first.  Shortly after taking office, Trump got into a childish war of words with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un; when Un sent out a message saying that his "Nuclear Button is on his desk at all times.”  Trump replied by tweet with "Will someone from his depleted and food starved regime please inform him that I too have a Nuclear Button, but it is a much bigger & more powerful one than his, and my Button works!"  Although, as we all know, nothing came of that petulant rant, it did raise the possibility of the president using the country's nuclear arsenal on another country.  And there's no law that could have stopped him.  It is perfectly within the power of the president to fire a nuclear weapon at any country at any time.  While it would appear to be common sense that our country only has such weapons as a deterrent, the idea that Trump or any other future president could decide to use weapons that could easily kill millions of people as an offensive strategy instead of a defensive one is terrifying.  This presidential power should be changed.

While this list does not cover all the violations and corruptions of the Trump administration, adopting these kind of common sense measures in the future could at least undo some of the damage done by the worst president in history.  The country deserves better in the future.

IMPEACHED AGAIN

 Yesterday, Donald Trump, the first president elected without any political or military experience, also became the first president to ever be impeached by the House of Representatives twice.  Along with setting that record, he is also the first to be impeached with ten members of his own party joining in the vote against him.  And in one of the most scathing (and in my opinion, best) verbal broadsides against him, Republican House member Lynn Cheney said that Trump “summoned the mob” that assaulted the Capitol Building and added that “There has never been a greater betrayal by a president.”

Anyone who knows the Constitution should have supported her and the two hundred and thirty two other House members that voted in favor of impeachment.  Because this was not just about partisan politics, this was about the executive branch of the government trying to intimidate the legislative branch to alter their vote. And this was a vote on something that was strictly a  ceremony, a final counting of the certified Electoral Votes that would finalize Joe Biden's victory.  But it's a ceremony that Trump and his followers wrongly believe that Vice President Mike Pence, as the leader of the Senate, could use to reject Electoral votes from states that Trump lost, granting him a second term.   Pence, in his first real break with the president, told Trump shortly before the vote that he does not have that power, incensing Trump, who denounced Pence at a morning rally a short distance from where the riot began.   

Now it bears stating that  Trump, like any other president, has the right to persuade or cajole members of congress to vote the way he wants.   But when his rhetoric extended to whipping up an angry mob to commit outright acts of violence ("You have to be strong!" He told them a rally shortly before the siege on the Capitol Building began) he violated the powers given him by the Constitution and became guilty of an impeachment worthy offense.

As more news and videos of the riot are being made public, what happened only seems to get worse, with many of the attendees planning more than a peaceful protest: a man who had posted his desire to shoot House Leader Nancy Pelosi was apprehended with more than one firearm.  Another man had molotov cocktails.  Bombs were left.  Numerous other weapons were brought.   One police officer was beaten to death, and several others were injured.  There are stories of congress people hiding in barricaded offices that had rioters banging on the doors.  And then there's Trump's behavior during the riot, which may have been worse than what he did before it.  According to the Washington Post's report of inside accounts, he seemed excited by what was happening on TV, and he refused to call in the National Guard, leaving that duty to Pence.  Trump didn't even call to check on Pence during  the riot, even as rioters chanted "Hang Mike Pence!".  Although yesterday Trump released a video denouncing violence, it was obviously an example of a little too little too late.  He even still failed to concede the election in it.

One of the crazy things about the riot is that many of the people involved are well educated professionals.  It just goes to show the power of cult driven conspiracies that a doctor or lawyer could believe that a violent uprising was needed to stop the empowerment of Satanic pedophilic cannibals.  Many people have pointed to the fact that if this had been a Black Lives Matter protest, there would have been far more security and far more violent riot control techniques used on the rioters.  This seems undeniably true; part of the reason may be that many police officers and security people are more sympathetic to right wing protests than left wing ones.  And there are even some Democratic congresspeople charging that their Republican counterparts were aware of the upcoming riot and aided the protestors.  Obviously, those are serious charges that will have to be investigated in what will be sure to be a flurry of investigations coming in the next few months.

Finally, it's impossible not to notice just how many of the rioters were white men, many from white supremacist groups like the Proud Boys.  In the end, I think the riot will go down, like the Trump presidency, as the failed last gasp of white male dominance in America.  It's the nature of power that people who have it will often do anything to hold on to it.  Like lie about an election and exhort others into violent acts to overturn that election.  January sixth will go down as one of the worst days in American history, and we have to either throw Trump and his strongest followers into the asheap of history or fracture as a country. The fact that the Republican party may be ready to move on without him is heartening, but he still remains popular with the party's base voters.  Either way,  if the United States does wind up splintering, the riot will be seen  by history as the flashpoint.  We will see.