The White House, whose occupants have always been flawed
With some 23 candidates vying for the Democratic Party presidential nomination, we’re starting to hear that some of them have -gasp- flaws! As is the case in every presidential election, the current crop of candidates are not unicorns, and only an out-of-touch purity voter should expect otherwise. The good news, however, is that Donald Trump has made it more than okay to be a Democratic presidential candidate and be human. Let’s hear about some of these flaws:
The Democratic National Committee (DNC), the governing committee and voice of the Democratic Party, has a video up at its website, as well as on YouTube, which shows the party’s “mission” and “message.” Here is the video:
Not surprisingly, the DNC video stands in stark contrast to the mission and message expressed by Donald Trump and the Republicans:
Russia’s Kremlin, home to Donald Trump’s friends and America’s enemies.
As we approach the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing, it’s a good reminder that America’s space program began as a response to Russian military activity. Specifically, the Soviet Union’s 1957 launch of the Sputnik satellite set off a dramatic reaction to what was viewed as the Soviet militarization of space, with rocket technology that could be used to launch nuclear weapons. The United States, led by the Democratic-majority U.S. Senate and Republican President Dwight Eisenhower, soon tasked the Senate Preparedness Subcommittee (which had been established in 1950 to deal with the then-looming crisis in Korea) with addressing the Soviet military threat from space, and created NASA. Within less than four months of the Sputnik launch, the U.S. launched its own satellite into orbit, and the “Space Race” was on. Eventually, America surpassed the U.S.S.R. by embarking on the Apollo program that led to the moon landing. The full-scale national effort of the Apollo program galvanized America to such an extent that the term “Apollo program” is now a figure of speech that means a large coordinated effort, involving scientists and deep governmental resources, to solve a huge challenge (such as climate change.)
The issue of “preparedness” in the face of a Russian threat is something that Democrats should be using now to attack Donald Trump and the Republicans. Specifically, Russia attacked our democracy in the 2016 elections. Russia’s attacks have been termed “cyber warfare,” and even Republican Dick Cheney has said that Russia’s attacks “could be considered an act of war.” In the internet age, Russia’s attacks on America arguably are as serious as the attacks on the United States at Pearl Harbor or on September 11, 2001. However, Donald Trump and many Republicans are refusing to defend us against this threat.
Beto O’Rourke, first to reject invitation from right wing religious group
Pete Buttigieg has joined Beto O’Rourke and Cory Booker on the growing list of Democratic presidential candidates who have turned down invitations from right wing religious group The Family Leader to speak at their September 2019 summit in Iowa. Booker released a statement explaining his rejection of the invitation:
I welcome any opportunity to talk about how faith guides me, but I cannot—in good conscience—attend an event put on by an organization that preaches bigotry and sows hate against the LGBTQ community. That's why I am declining an invitation to the Family Leader's July 12 summit.
One of the biggest political events to take place last week was U.S. Senator and presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren‘s announcement that, after reading the Mueller Report, she believes that the U.S. House “should initiate impeachment proceedings” against Donald Trump. Here is Warren’s tweet containing this announcement, which Warren reiterated during subsequent tweets and television interviews:
The severity of this misconduct demands that elected officials in both parties set aside political considerations and do their constitutional duty. That means the House should initiate impeachment proceedings against the President of the United States.
It seems like both mainstream and social news media are obsessed with Donald Trump and his latest Outrage of the Day. But under our Constitution, we have three co-equal branches of the federal government, and half of one of those branches — Congress — is in Democratic hands. The Democrats, led by Speaker Nancy Pelosi, just marked their first 100 days back in control of the House of Representatives, with some fanfare, including the Twitter hashtag #100DaysForThePeople. Pelosi also appeared on CBS‘ 60 Minutes program last Sunday to talk about what the Democrats have accomplished thus far this year, and what further actions they plan to take. Given that the House majority is the Democrats’ only foothold in the federal government at this time, they have done quite a lot:
House Democrats yesterday formally requestedDonald Trump‘s 2013 through 2018 personal tax returns, as well as the tax returns of eight Trump business entities, from the Internal Revenue Service. At the same time, an increasing number of Democratic presidential candidates have already released multiple prior years of tax returns, but U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders remains the outlier.
The reason for requesting presidential candidates’ tax returns comes down to one word: transparency. According to McClatchy DC, “[t]he returns provide voters a look into the personal finances and charitable contributions of candidates and gives insight into whether he or she has any potential conflicts of interest.” Paraphrasing Joseph Thorndike, author and Director of the Tax History Project at Tax Analysts, McClatchy indicates that, “[w]ithout the full returns, voters can’t see such items as sources of income, which tax breaks they claimed, what they might have deducted as business expenses or how much they gave to charity.” Accordingly, while releasing tax returns is not required by law, it has become a tradition for presidential candidates to do so since Richard Nixon in the early 1970s.
Yesterday, Facebook announced that, beginning next week, it will begin enforcing “a ban on praise, support and representation of white nationalism and separatism on Facebook and Instagram.” Facebook’s statement indicates that, while the company has always sought to target “white supremacy,”
[w]e didn’t originally apply the same rationale to expressions of white nationalism and separatism because we were thinking about broader concepts of nationalism and separatism — things like American pride and Basque separatism, which are an important part of people’s identity.
Much hay was made this week from Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi‘s answer to a Washington Post interviewer’s question about impeaching Donald Trump. Here’s the question and Pelosi’s response:
There have been increasing calls, including from some of your members, for impeachment of the president.
I’m not for impeachment. This is news. I’m going to give you some news right now because I haven’t said this to any press person before. But since you asked, and I’ve been thinking about this: Impeachment is so divisive to the country that unless there’s something so compelling and overwhelming and bipartisan, I don’t think we should go down that path, because it divides the country. And he’s just not worth it.
Many Democrats took to blogs and social media to express their disappointment with Speaker Pelosi’s answer. For example, here’s author and MSNBC contributor Malcolm Nance:
Wrong! What the hell is wrong with the @SpeakerPelosi Congress that they absolve themselves of their duty! Nothing is criminal anymore?! Trump can do and say like a dictator as he pleases? All of his crimes are OK even if you see them? This requires a public outcry. #Disgraceful. https://t.co/7m3lElzP5n
However, what this episode really shows is that the Democratic Party’s base (including a few House members) and its leadership have different considerations that allow them differing degrees of freedom in what they can say publicly at this time.
If you follow the mainstream media, Fox News or liberal blogs, you might think that all activity on the Democratic side is at the liberal end of the spectrum, with attention placed on new House members like the female minority trio of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib and Ilan Omar. You might think such activity and attention also translates directly to the field of 2020 Democratic presidential candidates. However, the person who currently tops the Democratic presidential polls is Joe Biden, who is considered a moderate and definitely not a fresh face. Although the media would portray this as a Democratic Party “rift,” it’s more like a disconnect. Folks following the latest media shiny objects might have forgotten, for example, that the last time the Democrats nominated an all-out liberal for president was U.S. Senator George McGovern in 1972, and he went down to one of the greatest defeats in presidential election history.
