Upstairs, Downstairs
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One thing that should bother Republicans:
Former President Donald Trump’s pick to unseat Rep. Liz Cheney in the race for Wyoming’s lone House seat holds a commanding 22-point lead with a month until the primary, a new Casper Star-Tribune poll shows.
Natural resources attorney Harriet Hageman leads Cheney 52% to 30%, the poll shows. No other challenger received more than 5% support. Only 11% of voters were undecided.
The poll, conducted for the Star-Tribune by Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy, surveyed 1,100 registered Wyoming voters likely to participate in the primary, resulting in a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percent, according to Brad Coker, Mason-Dixon managing director.
While the Cheney-Hageman race is one of the nation’s most closely watched, this is the first independent, public in-state poll to be conducted. It was performed from July 7 to July 11 – shortly after early voting began here.
And there is more coming:
CONCLUSION: Liz Cheney is almost certainly going to lose her seat – and Wyoming is going to lose a powerful conservative voice – simply because she won’t go along with Donald Trump’s attempts to subvert America’s government and undermine the rule of law and the faith people have in our system. In a very crowded field of examples, this might be the single most outrageous manifestation of the Republican Party’s murder-suicide pact with Mr. Trump.
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One thing that does bother Republicans:
CONCLUSION: The National Republican Senatorial Committee can lasso all the experienced consultants it wants and send/assign them to the Senate battleground states to try to help, but Democrats have a fine chance to keep the majority as long as underfunded “B” and “C” level GOP candidates toil in the competitive contests.
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One thing that should bother every American (via the New York Times’ team of Sanger + Baker):
Prince Mohammed has taken no responsibility. In an interview with The Atlantic earlier this year, he suggested Mr. Khashoggi was not important enough to assassinate. “If that’s the way we did things, Khashoggi would not even be among the top 1,000 people on the list,” he said.
Mr. Jubeir, the Saudi minister, told reporters on Friday that the United States was in no position to lecture.
“Did George Bush direct people to torture at Abu Ghraib?” Mr. Jubeir asked, referring to prisoner abuses during the Iraq War. “No, he did not.” The C.I.A. report on Prince Mohammed was “just an assessment,” he added, noting that other assessments, including over Iraq’s nonexistent nuclear weapons, “were wrong.”
Despite fitful moves toward reform in recent years, Saudi Arabia remains one of the most repressive places on the planet, disguised only by the trappings of wealth and the illusion of modernity. Just four months ago, the authorities here conducted a mass execution of 81 people, some for “disrupting the social fabric and national cohesion” and “participating in and inciting sit-ins and protests,” according to human rights groups.
Mr. Biden had been described by advisers as deeply reluctant to make the trip to see Prince Mohammed, changing his mind only after months of discussions with aides and the increasing imperative of stabilizing energy markets roiled by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
CONCLUSION: President Biden tried to have it both ways on MBS and then just got dissed on the world stage. Middle East realpolitik post 9/11 by American presidents is the norm; MBS is, sadly, not the worst thug on the sandy block the U.S. has played ball with. But it isn’t clear at this writing that what Mr. Biden will take home with him on Air Force One is even roughly worth the sacrifice of our national dignity. The Saudi ruler was born at night, but it wasn’t last night, and he and his media mythology makers played their American counterparts like a prized oud. The U.S. diplomatic team (including the president) are probably feeling relieved it wasn’t worse, but/and it was/is pretty bad.
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Two brutal post-mortems that should probably worry Ron Klain:
For the moment, Schumer has not indicated the path forward in the Senate, where work remains underway to prepare critical portions of the spending package for floor consideration. Democrats are set to confront the impasse directly at their private weekly lunch on Tuesday, two other people familiar with the matter said. They are expected to try to devise a strategy in the wake of Manchin’s demands, the aide said, at a time when tensions are running high.
Schumer aides declined to comment Friday.
At the White House, meanwhile, top aides to Biden already had grown dismayed and cynical about the negotiations. Only seven months earlier, the last attempt at a grand bargain around an economic package ended in public acrimony, with Manchin and the White House trading sharp barbs over who was to blame for collapse in talks.
“This is how the White House has always feared this would end,” said one White House adviser, speaking on the condition of anonymity to reflect conversations with administration officials. “It really is a stunning turnaround from the dreams of a Green New Deal to this.” (Washington Post)
The short-term political dynamics of an economy suffering from global inflation are punishing. The long-term prognosis of the party’s alienation from its multiracial working-class voters is grim. And the specter of the Republican Party’s descent into authoritarianism looms over everything.
Democrats needed to rise to the challenge of proving they had the capacity to use their limited powers in creative and productive ways. It is almost impossible to imagine now they will be able to say they succeeded.
CONCLUSION: Leader Schumer and Speaker Pelosi have a lot to ponder this weekend.
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Resolved: This Democratic video is really interesting.
Discuss.
