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There are three massive, interconnected stories percolating now, none of which are getting the proper attention in the news cycle:
1. President Biden’s invitation to congressional leaders to meet them next week in the face of Treasury Secretary Yellen’s warning about an early June debt ceiling breach deadline is in fact the opposite of a breakthrough.
2. Speaker McCarthy’s support for Ukraine and support from Senate Republicans suggest for now that he has been misunderestimated in some quarters.
3. Never-Again-Trump Republicans have zero theory of the case about how to stop their presidential frontrunner from becoming their nominee for a third straight cycle – and time and options are running out much faster than they seem to realize.
Now, here is my “to be sure” paragraph: To be sure, the parties are still more likely than not to compromise on the debt ceiling before it’s too late; Mr. McCarthy certainly faces some tough days ahead, including on funding for Ukraine soon; and Trump is not a sure thing for the nomination or, even more so, a general election win.
But, let’s not kid ourselves, either. Not even the smartest analysts can tell you in a linear way how the Deadly Dance Over Debt ends. McCarthy’s newfound strength is a wildcard whose implications are only hazily understood as of now. And Trump’s hold on the Republican nomination is significantly greater than his opponents would like to admit – and Gerard Baker speaks truth to power when he declares skepticism about “the widely touted idea that Donald Trump can’t win [the general election] next year.”
Let’s take this three mega developments in reverse order.
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1. TRUMP REMAINS THE DOMINANT FORCE IN REPUBLICAN POLITICS
A new CBS News poll, with clever questions, is one of the most important and illuminating surveys we have seen in some time, as it puts in very sharp relief both the dimensions of and reasons for Trump’s current hammerlock on the voters of his party.
Here’s the top of the network’s write up:
To the extent the Republican primary is a contest at all right now, it looks like it's one between Donald Trump and a sentiment one might call "Trump fatigue."
And Trump is winning that matchup easily.
Here's why: MAGA-sounding ideas are widely held in the Republican electorate, an environment that plays heavily to Trump's advantage.
There's big demand for a candidate who says Trump won in 2020, who challenges woke ideas, who doesn't criticize Trump and, for good measure, makes liberals angry. Trump leads in all of these areas.
Meanwhile there are some GOPers who say they're "exhausted" by Trump, and that he's too controversial, but they are greatly outnumbered today.
You need to read the entirety of this extraordinary poll, but here are some slides to give you the point:
4 in 10, rabbi!!!!!
And/but Trump isn’t resting on his laurels. He and his team are following the political rule that if you are moving at 800 miles per hour, your opponents can’t slow you down — let alone stop you.
The many dimensions of the sheer political brilliance of Trump agreeing to do a CNN town hall in New Hampshire next week are too complicated and numerous for me to completely fathom and explicate here, but this is a start:
In one fell swoop, by agreeing to CNN’s perplexing invite, Trump
* discombobulated and divided the liberal media over whether they should play ball with Trump this quadrennial cycle;
* showed a commitment to New Hampshire with a quick return to the Granite State (he was just there last week) and by engaging in their fabled and favored format of voter interaction;
* and exposed DeSantis’ various limitations; it is impossible to imagine Trump’s rival agreeing to do anything like a town hall with CNN.
Plus, going into the Fake News lion den proves Trump can still, after all these years, surprise and intrigue.
With Glenn Youngkin on Monday effectively showing us, again, he has no fire in the belly to run for president, the Never-Again-Trumpers are left with DeSantis or bust as of now – and their confidence in the Sunshine State topper’s capacity to dethrone Trump is at an all-time low.
No other prospect in or out of the race has a plausible theory of the case about how to beat Trump for the nomination. Heck, most of them don’t even have an implausible theory of the case they can enunciate.
And for those hoping for a white knight to swoop in late and save the day, there is a little thing called “filing deadlines to qualify for the ballot,” along with a big thing called “delegate accumulation” that makes such a dream as plausible as Youngkin and Nikki Haley agreeing to team up now and run as a ticket.
It isn’t quite time yet, but we are getting much closer than you realize: The Establishment wing of the Republican Party could soon have to shift from “How do we stop Trump from being the nominee?” to “What do we do with Trump as our nominee?”
****
2. SPEAKER MCCARTHY IS A FORCE TO BE RECKONED WITH
Watch his words in Israel in response to a Russian reporter’s question about the war:
Couple that with the remarkable support Senate Republicans are giving the Golden Stater in the debt limit standoff (with no sign of House of Lords dealmaking to try to jam him) – and you will quickly come to see that Joe Biden is not the only Irish-American pol who has been taken too lightly in some quarters.
Two questions:
Can McCarthy keep this up?
If McCarthy does keep it up, what are the implications?
I don’t know yet.
****
3. ONLY IN WASHINGTON DOES AN URGENT CRISIS THREATENING THE WORLD ECONOMY LEAD TO AN INCONCLUSIVE MEETING SCHEDULED FOR…WAIT FOR IT…NEXT WEEK!
Before we get to the spoiler in which the most likely solution to the debt/budget standoff is revealed, note that the White House is sending clear signals that the confab that much of the media is casting as the first step on the road to compromise is, in fact, being viewed by the administration as a chance to re-tell Kevin McCarthy to pound sand.
From Politico, on what the president plans to say to his invited GOP guests next week:
“If you need to hear again that it’s your responsibility to address the debt ceiling without conditions and a ransom,” said a senior administration official who spoke about internal thinking on condition of anonymity, “then he can say that again.”
And from the Washington Post on why Team Biden is holding firm:
The White House has leaned on polling suggesting Republicans will take the lion’s share of the blame if the worst should happen, according to the senior aides. Aides are confident that their messaging about important programs that the Republicans want to cut will resonate with voters — and that they will be able to link the collapse to Republican “extremism” on the economy and their out-of-step stances on other issues like abortion and guns.
However, the Post also says this:
Some Biden allies and Democratic lawmakers privately acknowledged even before the Treasury letter that the president will ultimately need to cut a deal, with much of the speculation so far focusing on the potential for a joint budget-and-debt-ceiling agreement later this year that offers Republicans minor concessions on spending — and crucially allows both sides to walk away claiming that they won.
However, however, the Post also also says this:
But on Capitol Hill and in the administration, there’s been no consensus on what exactly that compromise might look like, or even how to thaw the bitter standoff to the degree it was possible to reach a deal — much less in four weeks.
The only reason to think this will all work out is because it has to all work out.
I associate myself with the theorizing of the great Ben Koltun, a vital Twitter follow, who says, among other things:
****
In conclusion, Trump gallops, McCarthy surprises, Biden sticks to his guns for now, and Trump, McCarthy, and Biden all want Trump to be the Republican nominee, but for three different reasons.
****
Two other highly significant narratives in this news cycle:
1. The Vogue slideshow of the most imperative Met Gala outfits is to die for.
Are you a typical Wide World of News reader?
In other words, how many of these folks can you name?
Go view the whole Vogue thing! Great pictures!!!!
2. Gordon Lightfoot has passed away. I leave it to you to decide whether “Sundown” or “If You Could Read My Mind” is a better song.