Brian Beutler/Crooked:
The case for political caution is thus weaker and narrower than it’s presented, either by liberal pundits, or the timorous Democratic establishment, or the crush of NeverTrump Republicans warning Democrats that Trump will win re-election unless they appease NeverTrump Republicans.
It is that, because the stakes of the election are so high, candidates should only adopt positions that poll well in every framing, in order to undermine Republicans when they flood the campaign with propaganda about Democratic radicalism. The counterarguments are that Democrats risk demobilizing activists by responding to a crisis like Trump with half-measures, and that an incumbent as weak as him presents an opportunity for Democrats to run and win on a far-reaching agenda.
This is a debate worth having, particularly over picayune issues that poll particularly badly. But it’s not one that can be resolved empirically. Democratic voters will ultimately decide which theory of the case the party will test next year, and because none of us can dictate to them with any confidence which candidates and which ideas are most electable, they should be encouraged to vote for the candidates and ideas they like the most, and candidates should be encouraged to run on ideas they believe in, and can speak about persuasively, with conviction.
As the race progresses, we’ll have a much clearer sense of whether Democratic voters and members the general public are really unfavorably disposed to the field’s left-most candidates, and whether Democrats will once again select a nominee who doesn’t take the left-most position on health care. That’s a reasonable way way to resolve concerns about electability. Encouraging candidates and voters to let fear of Republican demagoguery shape their values and ambitions is not, because the demagoguery is coming no matter what.
Rachel Bitecofer/Wason Center, Christopher Newport (my bold):
With 16 Months to go, Negative Partisanship Predicts the 2020 Presidential Election
Based on its 2018 performance, my model, and the theory that structures it, seem well poised to tackle the 2020 presidential election – 16 months out. I’ll serve up that result below, but first let’s set the table by reviewing my model’s 2018 forecasting success.
Not only did I predict that they would gain nearly double the seats they needed, but I also identified a specific list of Republican seats Democrats would flip, including some, such as Virginia CD7, that were listed as “Lean Republican” by the majority of race raters at the time...
At the end of the day, Independents will be asked to weigh what Democrats might do against what Republicans, particularly Trump, are doing; the reverse situation from 2016 when Democrats suffered from the referendum effect among Independents. Even if the Democrat’s nominee is unabashedly liberal, it is not likely Trump can win a referendum among college-educated Independent voters without a dramatic transformation in both tone and style.
Republicans can survive an under-maximized Democratic turnout surge, like the one we saw in 2018, but not one that it is combined with the loss of Independent voters powered by a, and not one without a corresponding Republican turnout surge which can only be accomplished via things likely to further isolate Independent voters and agitate Democrats.
Does the Democrat’s nominee matter? Sure, to an extent. If the ticket has a woman, a person of color or a Latino, or a female who is also a person of color, Democratic Party turnout will surge more in really important places. If the nominee is Biden he’d be well-advised to consider Democratic voter turnout his number one consideration when drawing his running mate to avoid the critical mistake made by Hillary Clinton in 2016. This is true for any of the white male candidates. If the nominee hails from the progressive wing of the party, it will provoke massive handwringing both within the party and the media that if not controlled could become self-reinforcing. But the Democrats are not complacent like they were in 2016 and I doubt there is any amount of polling or favorable forecasts that will make them so. That fear will play a crucial role in their 2020 victory. We will not see a divided Democratic Party in 2020.
And just out (Biden still in lead, asked different ways such as volunteer a name, list of candidates, first + second choice):
From WaPo poll, Biden Sanders, Warren Harris are top tier:
When second-choice preferences are added to first-choice selections, Biden remains atop the field, with 50 percent of Democrats saying he is either their first or second choice. Sanders stands at 40 percent in the combined ranking, followed by Warren at 25 percent and Harris at 24 percent.
Think about what Comey did (Comey Letter Swung Election For Trump, Consumer Survey Suggests) and then this (the data says it helped Trump):
Mara Dolan/WGBH (my bold):
Impeaching Trump: The Case For Making The Case To Massachusetts
But even if Democrats unite to support impeachment, it won't be enough. There must be support from the center, with independent voters. A new poll by Left of Center shows 57% of independent voters in Massachusetts oppose impeachment. If it's 57% in highly educated, blue Massachusetts, what must it be in NC-09, or in swing districts in Texas, Florida, and Georgia? Independent voters in Massachusetts aren't even convinced Russia interfered in our election, with 51% believing it just didn't happen.
And yet. The moral and legal justification for impeachment must be honored. Dig a little deeper, and opportunity appears. Almost one in five, 19%, of the people who oppose impeachment do so because they think it would help re-elect the President. 18% of the people who oppose impeachment think there isn't enough evidence yet. That means that if the current case, which isn't strong enough, could be made stronger by opening an impeachment inquiry and conducting hearings, it may persuade enough voters that impeachment becomes not a risk, but a strength.
As a public defender, I learned one absolute about going to trial. You don't do it when you think you've got the guy. You do it when, and only when, you have absolutely ALL the evidence you can use to convict. That's where Robert Mueller's upcoming testimony could start to make enough of an impression on independent voters that the needle moves. Even if all he does is read aloud from his own report, more of the evidence against the President will be harder to miss, and harder to disregard.
Greg Sargent/WaPo:
Trump’s latest migrant horrors demand a real Democratic response. Here’s one.
Democrats, by contrast, blame the deaths on Trump’s effort to make it harder for migrants to apply for asylum, which is forcing greater risks. They have pilloried Trump over his horribly cruel and inhumane treatment of migrants, while calling for other reforms that would ease the crisis.
Now House Democrats are set to roll out a major new proposal on the asylum crisis that will constitute a big down payment on the longer-term argument Democrats are making.
The new proposal from Democrats
The Northern Triangle and Border Stabilization Act — to be introduced by Rep. Zoe Lofgren of California and other senior Democrats — comes as Trump and Democrats are battling over $4.5 billion in border aid. Democrats want to channel the money to humanitarian ends. Trump is chafing at such restrictions.
But this short-term battle, while enormously important, is only the beginning of a much bigger argument.
Well, about that hearing:
Monkey Cage Blog/WaPo:
How Trump’s reality-show diplomacy with North Korea could backfire
An ad hoc summit displaces real diplomacy. Although it is unlikely Kim would give up North Korea’s nuclear capability — it’s too important to his regime’s security — there are other ways diplomatic talks could be productive in limiting or stabilizing the U.S.-North Korea standoff, as Mark Bell explained in the Monkey Cage last year.
But if the reality show continues, that kind of progress will be elusive, and there are at least four ways it could lead to a situation worse than what Trump inherited:
1. There is no process and no progress.
Trump and Kim might repeat the performance from the June summit and agree to unvetted, uncoordinated political rhetoric that stalls later during technical negotiations. Without an underlying process to justify leader meetings, summit diplomacy ultimately fails — but in a way that lets both Trump and Kim blame others.
Such a failure would leave the United States to deal with a nuclear North Korea every bit as capable of holding U.S. territory at risk of a nuclear strike as when it demonstrated the ability to do so with the launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile on Nov. 28, 2017.
Long ways to go.
Successful Farming with a f/u to a “Trump pays crooks with your tax dollars” story:
A Brazilian-owned meat processing company undercut its competition by more than $1 per pound to win nearly $78 million in pork contracts through a federal program launched to help American farmers offset the impact from an ongoing trade war.
As a result, JBS USA has won more than 26 percent of the $300 million the USDA has allocated to pork so far – more than any other company, according to an analysis of bid awards by the Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting .
So some CNN poll data supports… humanitarian points of view:
And take this the way you take the Daily Kos straw poll:
Eric Levitz/New York Magazine:
Why the Democratic Party looks more progressive in presidential primary debates than it is in real life.
As many pundits have pointed out in recent months, the Democratic primary electorate is far from uniformly liberal. In fact, the median Democratic primary voter is largely insensitive to intraparty ideological divides (the most popular second choice among Joe Biden voters is Bernie Sanders, and vice versa).
But the median Democratic voter – who closely monitors primary campaigns eight months before the first Iowans cast their ballots – is a different animal. Democrats who pay a lot of attention to politics tend to be more ideological, and ideologically left wing, than those who do not. And these high-information, highly progressive voters include potential campaign volunteers, activists, policy staff, partisan pundits, and small-dollar donors— people whose power to influence the primary’s outcome extends well beyond their behavior in the ballot box. This predominantly progressive voting bloc can shape media narratives, staff get-out-the-vote operations, vouch for a candidate with broader constituencies, and help keep a campaign funded. Before the advent of small-dollar digital fundraising, the influence of money in politics was the bane of the left’s existence; in the 2020 primary, it’s arguably a source of left-wing strength.
For these reasons, Democratic candidates have some incentive to favor the strongly held preferences of their party’s highly engaged, progressive minority over the (often weakly held) moderate preferences of its broader base on issues where there is a divergence between the two.
Hey, the Senate is important!!!
And finally:
Congratulations USWNT. Be inspired by Sue Bird (pro basketball, UCONN):
So the President F*cking Hates My Girlfriend
First of all, I’ve gotta get this on the record, if it’s not already clear: I’m SO proud of Megan!!And the entire damn USWNT. That’s why I’m writing this article, mainly. So if you could do me a favor, let’s just take a second, for real, and appreciate this RUN my girl’s been on?? Like, take away all of the “extra” stuff — and just focus for a second on the soccer alone. Two goals against Spain. Two goals against France, WHILE A GUEST IN THEIR MAISON. I want to hit on a lot of other topics while I’m here, and trust me I will — but I just think it’s also really important not to forget what this is actually, first and foremost, about, you know? It’s about a world-class athlete, operating at the absolute peak of her powers, on the absolute biggest stage that there is. It’s about an athlete f*cking killing it.
It’s about Megan coming through.