A few years back - or possibly longer, now - Richard Ford wrote in the LRB a delightfully scathing analysis of the selection of candidates for President. In it, he point out that we demand more demonstrated competence of someone hired to mow our lawn than we do of our candidates for POTUS. Paraphrasing, "we would at least require that the applicant for the job knows how to operate the lawn mower."
I voted for a third party in each of the last two elections. I left the Republican party because they nominated Trump. That said, on balance I approved of his policy choices while he was president. I just don't like his demeanor. I think he's an asshole. I am a conservative. I voted against him a second time in 2020.
Jan 6 was awful and Trump should have intervened immediately, but if that had been a protest AGAINST Trump it would have been labeled "mostly peaceful" by the media. It has been called insurrection by liberals and the media. If so it was the weakest insurrection ever. Don't they know that "those people" have all the guns? They must have just forgotten them at the insurrection. They still repeat the lie that police officers were killed. No, they were not.
While you correctly point out many of Trump's flaws, you did not mention the significant flaws on the other side, much of it in the media. While they are not candidates, the media is clearly in the bag for the Democrats and needs to be held to account.
When have the Republicans ever conducted a year's long disinformation campaign to show that their opponent was a Russian agent? The Steele dossier was garbage, and the press ran with it long after it was shown to be.
The Democrats influenced the suppression of the New York Post story about Hunter's laptop. I don't care what Hunter does, but there appears to be significant information there that points to Joe's involvement in influence peddling. This was sold as "Russian disinformation". Hunter later sued because it violated his privacy. It is clear that they knew from the start that they were lying.
"Very fine people." Trump did say those words, but in the same breath said that it applied only to peaceful protestors that wanted the civil war statues to remain. He disavowed and condemned the racists in clear language. It's an obvious lie to say otherwise. The sitting President has repeated this lie often. So has the sitting Vice-President.
While Trump made much noise about "Lock her up!" he did not use the power of his office to pursue Hillary to do just that. The Democrats have. Much is made about 34 "felonies". Even a brief inquiry into this shows that those "felonies" were misdemeanors that have been conflated into felonies. The statute of limitations had expired. The judge, no fan of Mr. Trump, lifted it. No other citizen of the US would have faced this prosecution. Sadly, it was a show trial. There is no chance for that conviction to stand.
If you are having a hard time imagining which democrat would sit on his/her hands for 8 hours while a "mostly peaceful" protest raged not far away, you should consider Tim Walz and his reaction to the not so peaceful protests in Minnesota. More than 1,500 buildings were damaged, destroyed, or looted in the Twin Cities area. Some structures were completely burned down, including businesses, offices, and housing units. Two deaths were directly related to these riots.
Is the other side as bad as Trump? In some ways, no. In some ways, worse. I don't agree that it is a false equivalency.
"but if that had been a protest AGAINST Trump it would have been labeled "mostly peaceful" by the media"
Jesus, why do people say things like this? Yes, there is a liberal bias in the media. Mainly because liberals are more commonly found in media and but also partly because reality has a liberal bias.
It is simply not possible to cover Trump's Republicans and Biden's Democrats as if they're equally good/bad and be doing your job as a journalist. However much you hate the Democrats (and I'm not saying you personally do or don't), there is no equivalent to Trump's attempts to steal the election or undermine faith in democracy or undermine America's intelligence agencies in favour of Putin, among the Democrats.
But anyway, yes, there is a liberal bias in the media. But if a bunch of Democrats, in protest about Trump, had stormed the Capitol building, beaten police with the American flag, and smeared their shit on the walls, the media would not have reported it as "Mostly peaceful." This is ridiculous and you know it. And if they *had* done these things, you wouldn't be saying it was "the weakest protest ever."
An insurrection is not"weak" when it gets to the point where there is a gallows outside the Capitol building and a mob shouting to hang Mike Pence as elected officials are trying to certify the results of a democratic election.
Yes, the media suppressed the Hunter Biden laptop story. This is extremely bad, and highlights the bias in the media that you refer to. I'm not downplaying this problem. But you can't act as if it cancels out all of the stuff Trump has done. This is much more in the same ballpark as Trump's tax fraud or his connections to Jeffrey Epstein (which also haven't been covered in the press) or his adulation of Vladimir Putin.
If nobody had ever found out about Hunter Biden's laptop, it would have been unjust, but literally nothing would have happened in the world. It wouldn't have affected your life or the state of democracy on America or, really much of anything. Nobody truly cares about the laptop, they care about the lies, which, as I said, is totally valid.
But for some reason, the same people don't care about Trump's lies. And Trump's lies have destroyed politics in America. I watched the McCain vs Obama debate a few weeks ago. And McCain's concession speech when he lost (y'know, the speech Trump still hasn't given) and you should be weeping for what Trump has stolen from America.
You can't say anything bad about Trump that I'm likely to disagree with. I do care about Trump's lies. I just don't think that they rise above the egregious behavior of his opponents.
Trump claimed that there were 250,000 or so people at the rally on Jan 6. Other estimates put the number at about 80,000. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, about 1,100 people have been arrested in connection with the January 6 attack as of late 2023, many, but not all of whom entered the Capitol building. The breach involved individuals engaging in illegal activities, including vandalism, theft, and violence, while some entered the building without causing harm.
That's a very small percentage of people that came to the rally. They committed crimes, and they are being prosecuted at a level out of proportion to people that burned down enough buildings to rate the Floyd protests as the most expensive civil unrest ever with insured losses totaling between 1 and 2 billion dollars. Actual losses were certainly higher as these were only insured losses. I asked chat-GPT because I did not know how else to approach the question and this was part of the answer "...those involved in serious crimes like looting or violence during the George Floyd protests also faced significant penalties, though typically less severe than those imposed on January 6 rioters."
This was the query I submitted if you want to read the whole answer. "have jan 6 protesters received harsher sentences than George Floyd protesters?"
I think you are probably familiar with Handwaving Freakoutery. If you aren't you should be. He is awesome. Here is his measure of Civil Unrest where he compares Jan 6 and other events to the "Mostly Peaceful Summer of 2020". https://hwfo.substack.com/p/a-new-unit-of-measure-for-civil-unrest Jan 6 barely registers.
Yes, the protesters wanted the results of the election changed. Protesters always want some change. But not a single person has even been charged with "insurrection" and they were clearly unprepared to overthrow the government. Hell, Madonna wants to blow up the white house. And protesters often say very bad things, like "Hang Mike Pence" or "Kill all Cops". That's wrong but it's not insurrection.
I love your work as I think you are an objective observer. I just disagree that this is a false equivalence.
“Trump claimed that there were 250,000 or so people at the rally on Jan 6. Other estimates put the number at about 80,000.”
😅Trump in a nutshell.
Nobody cares how many people were at the rally. If the people had stayed outside instead of actually trying to stop the certification, it would have been mostly a “nothing burger” as the kids like to say (although Trump’s lies would still be a huge issue).
So no, setting up a gallows and shouting “Hang Mike Pence” isn’t an insurrection, but storming into the Capitol building as elected officials try to certify a democratic election, physically attacking Capitol police as they try to prevent you, and sending the aforementioned officials into lockdown because they legitimately fear for their life? Yes, I think that’s an attempted insurrection. It did, in fact, delay the certification. And the stated aim, from Trump himself, was to pressure Mike Pence not to accept the results.
So yes, I do think the Jan 6th protestors should have received harsher sentences than the BLM rioters (although I’m not sure I think the people who *didn’t* enter the building should have received much punishment), because this wasn’t just a riot, it was an attack on democracy. Riots are bad, but a riot that attempts to overthrow the will of the people is, at least to me, very obviously worse.
There's the rub. Trump is an asshole, but sometimes assholes are good leaders.
You know a tree by its fruit. Setting political rhetoric aside, what is the fruit of Trump's career and Presidency. What is the fruit of Harris's career and activity in the Senate and as a VP? That's hard to evaluate because of political bias.
That partly depends upon priorities. Nuclear war? Abortion? Trans? Suicide and attempted suicide rate. Blatant censorship and disinformation, including disinformation claims of the other sides disinformation? The list of things that people prioritize is long.
I'm the past I made spreadsheets to compare the candidates. What did they "do" if they held office? Who endorces them? What do they claim and do they walk the walk. I weighted the results according to my priorities. I suspect the most people come closer to being single issue voters, including the issue of "I don't like him/her."
An honest (will never happen) score board without weighting (voters supply their own) would be helpful. But that really isn't possible in this day and age. You have fringe propaganda and disinformation from the most dangerous source (government). Always a blend of truth and lies. It's hard to be optimistic.
Understood. What went right or wrong under a certain President is not entirely their doing. That makes it difficult to make broad claims and we end up with, not as bad as Biden equipping the Taliban military. Not starting new wars. Attempting diplomacy with N Korea and Russia where the situation is dangerous at the moment, notice how it ends up a comparison. But the results are complex.
Sooner or later, someone is going to call America's bluff. Our arrogant, we can always nuke you ignores MAD and America's extreme vulnerability. We are closer to that now, but how much credit and blame goes to Trump or Biden alone?
I understand that you are not going to drop the Trump is worse thing and I'm certainly not trying to change your mind or disagree.
At this point if it was possible to compare the results and world situation at the end of a Trump and Harris Presidency with some sort of dual reality, I wouldn't be willing to bet my life savings on who gets the best result. Since I want what is best for my country and the world, I hope that whoever wins surprises the naysayers and does a good job and obtains the most beneficial result, even if it is in spite of themself, Not being a disaster might be the best we can hope for.
In the end, I will never cast a deciding vote or know that my opinion is best, so my thoughts are just conversation.
Well-put as always, sir! Aside from the fact that Hillary Clinton frequently said the 2016 election was stolen, and hasn't recanted that as far as I know, your points are on point. Now if only we could hibernate for the next three weeks.
Hmm, fair point about Hillary, although I think she was doing/saying something quite different to Trump. Hillary won the popular vote in 2016 by something like 2 million votes if memory serves, so her feeling aggrieved about losing makes more sense.
And more to the point, she accepted the loss, gave her concession speech, which Trump still has yet to do, and didn't encourage a mob to try to overturn the results. These aren't small differences.
Democrats have gone a bit too far in accepting election results, IMHO. Al Gore should have been our 43rd President. The Supreme Court wronged the American Public in an unsurprising preemption of our rights. But for the sake of a peaceful transfer of power, he conceded instead of fostering a rageful mob.
Steve, I realize you wrote about false equivalency and it shines a light on a related issue.
Democrats can say little about Harris before they start talking about Trump. Trumpeters (not all Republicans are Trumpseters) say little about him before they start talking about Harris, or perhaps more commonly, Democrats in general. Ad homin vs policy.
I realize that the election is a deadly, for the world perhaps, game with winner and loser where the world may be the big loser, but it is noteworthy that there is so little non-empty platitude talk about policy of their own without turning it into what's wrong with them.
A big why s/he would be a disaster, rather than why I would be a better choice than a panhandler with a cardboard sign at a stoplight.
Would we be better served by less "we're not equivalent" and more, this is how I/we would be good for humanity" and not just because "s/he's worse!"?
Or is it impossible when talking about politicians and government to not end up with who is worse?
A few years back - or possibly longer, now - Richard Ford wrote in the LRB a delightfully scathing analysis of the selection of candidates for President. In it, he point out that we demand more demonstrated competence of someone hired to mow our lawn than we do of our candidates for POTUS. Paraphrasing, "we would at least require that the applicant for the job knows how to operate the lawn mower."
Spot on. This is a separate problem, but yes, this problem is writ large almost every single politician I can think of. 😅
I voted for a third party in each of the last two elections. I left the Republican party because they nominated Trump. That said, on balance I approved of his policy choices while he was president. I just don't like his demeanor. I think he's an asshole. I am a conservative. I voted against him a second time in 2020.
Jan 6 was awful and Trump should have intervened immediately, but if that had been a protest AGAINST Trump it would have been labeled "mostly peaceful" by the media. It has been called insurrection by liberals and the media. If so it was the weakest insurrection ever. Don't they know that "those people" have all the guns? They must have just forgotten them at the insurrection. They still repeat the lie that police officers were killed. No, they were not.
While you correctly point out many of Trump's flaws, you did not mention the significant flaws on the other side, much of it in the media. While they are not candidates, the media is clearly in the bag for the Democrats and needs to be held to account.
When have the Republicans ever conducted a year's long disinformation campaign to show that their opponent was a Russian agent? The Steele dossier was garbage, and the press ran with it long after it was shown to be.
The Democrats influenced the suppression of the New York Post story about Hunter's laptop. I don't care what Hunter does, but there appears to be significant information there that points to Joe's involvement in influence peddling. This was sold as "Russian disinformation". Hunter later sued because it violated his privacy. It is clear that they knew from the start that they were lying.
"Very fine people." Trump did say those words, but in the same breath said that it applied only to peaceful protestors that wanted the civil war statues to remain. He disavowed and condemned the racists in clear language. It's an obvious lie to say otherwise. The sitting President has repeated this lie often. So has the sitting Vice-President.
While Trump made much noise about "Lock her up!" he did not use the power of his office to pursue Hillary to do just that. The Democrats have. Much is made about 34 "felonies". Even a brief inquiry into this shows that those "felonies" were misdemeanors that have been conflated into felonies. The statute of limitations had expired. The judge, no fan of Mr. Trump, lifted it. No other citizen of the US would have faced this prosecution. Sadly, it was a show trial. There is no chance for that conviction to stand.
If you are having a hard time imagining which democrat would sit on his/her hands for 8 hours while a "mostly peaceful" protest raged not far away, you should consider Tim Walz and his reaction to the not so peaceful protests in Minnesota. More than 1,500 buildings were damaged, destroyed, or looted in the Twin Cities area. Some structures were completely burned down, including businesses, offices, and housing units. Two deaths were directly related to these riots.
Is the other side as bad as Trump? In some ways, no. In some ways, worse. I don't agree that it is a false equivalency.
"but if that had been a protest AGAINST Trump it would have been labeled "mostly peaceful" by the media"
Jesus, why do people say things like this? Yes, there is a liberal bias in the media. Mainly because liberals are more commonly found in media and but also partly because reality has a liberal bias.
It is simply not possible to cover Trump's Republicans and Biden's Democrats as if they're equally good/bad and be doing your job as a journalist. However much you hate the Democrats (and I'm not saying you personally do or don't), there is no equivalent to Trump's attempts to steal the election or undermine faith in democracy or undermine America's intelligence agencies in favour of Putin, among the Democrats.
But anyway, yes, there is a liberal bias in the media. But if a bunch of Democrats, in protest about Trump, had stormed the Capitol building, beaten police with the American flag, and smeared their shit on the walls, the media would not have reported it as "Mostly peaceful." This is ridiculous and you know it. And if they *had* done these things, you wouldn't be saying it was "the weakest protest ever."
An insurrection is not"weak" when it gets to the point where there is a gallows outside the Capitol building and a mob shouting to hang Mike Pence as elected officials are trying to certify the results of a democratic election.
Yes, the media suppressed the Hunter Biden laptop story. This is extremely bad, and highlights the bias in the media that you refer to. I'm not downplaying this problem. But you can't act as if it cancels out all of the stuff Trump has done. This is much more in the same ballpark as Trump's tax fraud or his connections to Jeffrey Epstein (which also haven't been covered in the press) or his adulation of Vladimir Putin.
If nobody had ever found out about Hunter Biden's laptop, it would have been unjust, but literally nothing would have happened in the world. It wouldn't have affected your life or the state of democracy on America or, really much of anything. Nobody truly cares about the laptop, they care about the lies, which, as I said, is totally valid.
But for some reason, the same people don't care about Trump's lies. And Trump's lies have destroyed politics in America. I watched the McCain vs Obama debate a few weeks ago. And McCain's concession speech when he lost (y'know, the speech Trump still hasn't given) and you should be weeping for what Trump has stolen from America.
You can't say anything bad about Trump that I'm likely to disagree with. I do care about Trump's lies. I just don't think that they rise above the egregious behavior of his opponents.
Trump claimed that there were 250,000 or so people at the rally on Jan 6. Other estimates put the number at about 80,000. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, about 1,100 people have been arrested in connection with the January 6 attack as of late 2023, many, but not all of whom entered the Capitol building. The breach involved individuals engaging in illegal activities, including vandalism, theft, and violence, while some entered the building without causing harm.
That's a very small percentage of people that came to the rally. They committed crimes, and they are being prosecuted at a level out of proportion to people that burned down enough buildings to rate the Floyd protests as the most expensive civil unrest ever with insured losses totaling between 1 and 2 billion dollars. Actual losses were certainly higher as these were only insured losses. I asked chat-GPT because I did not know how else to approach the question and this was part of the answer "...those involved in serious crimes like looting or violence during the George Floyd protests also faced significant penalties, though typically less severe than those imposed on January 6 rioters."
This was the query I submitted if you want to read the whole answer. "have jan 6 protesters received harsher sentences than George Floyd protesters?"
I think you are probably familiar with Handwaving Freakoutery. If you aren't you should be. He is awesome. Here is his measure of Civil Unrest where he compares Jan 6 and other events to the "Mostly Peaceful Summer of 2020". https://hwfo.substack.com/p/a-new-unit-of-measure-for-civil-unrest Jan 6 barely registers.
Yes, the protesters wanted the results of the election changed. Protesters always want some change. But not a single person has even been charged with "insurrection" and they were clearly unprepared to overthrow the government. Hell, Madonna wants to blow up the white house. And protesters often say very bad things, like "Hang Mike Pence" or "Kill all Cops". That's wrong but it's not insurrection.
I love your work as I think you are an objective observer. I just disagree that this is a false equivalence.
“Trump claimed that there were 250,000 or so people at the rally on Jan 6. Other estimates put the number at about 80,000.”
😅Trump in a nutshell.
Nobody cares how many people were at the rally. If the people had stayed outside instead of actually trying to stop the certification, it would have been mostly a “nothing burger” as the kids like to say (although Trump’s lies would still be a huge issue).
But as you know, they went much, much further than that. And they knew what they were doing. This wasn’t just some spur of the moment rush of blood (https://x.com/january6thcmte/status/1535082372030414861?s=61&t=jJ3uxN_f76fIkbFMc7zXqg) (please do watch this, I think a lot of people have forgotten what went down that day).
So no, setting up a gallows and shouting “Hang Mike Pence” isn’t an insurrection, but storming into the Capitol building as elected officials try to certify a democratic election, physically attacking Capitol police as they try to prevent you, and sending the aforementioned officials into lockdown because they legitimately fear for their life? Yes, I think that’s an attempted insurrection. It did, in fact, delay the certification. And the stated aim, from Trump himself, was to pressure Mike Pence not to accept the results.
So yes, I do think the Jan 6th protestors should have received harsher sentences than the BLM rioters (although I’m not sure I think the people who *didn’t* enter the building should have received much punishment), because this wasn’t just a riot, it was an attack on democracy. Riots are bad, but a riot that attempts to overthrow the will of the people is, at least to me, very obviously worse.
There's the rub. Trump is an asshole, but sometimes assholes are good leaders.
You know a tree by its fruit. Setting political rhetoric aside, what is the fruit of Trump's career and Presidency. What is the fruit of Harris's career and activity in the Senate and as a VP? That's hard to evaluate because of political bias.
That partly depends upon priorities. Nuclear war? Abortion? Trans? Suicide and attempted suicide rate. Blatant censorship and disinformation, including disinformation claims of the other sides disinformation? The list of things that people prioritize is long.
I'm the past I made spreadsheets to compare the candidates. What did they "do" if they held office? Who endorces them? What do they claim and do they walk the walk. I weighted the results according to my priorities. I suspect the most people come closer to being single issue voters, including the issue of "I don't like him/her."
An honest (will never happen) score board without weighting (voters supply their own) would be helpful. But that really isn't possible in this day and age. You have fringe propaganda and disinformation from the most dangerous source (government). Always a blend of truth and lies. It's hard to be optimistic.
"There's the rub. Trump is an asshole, but sometimes assholes are good leaders."
Almost everybody who has worked with Trump says he's a terrible leader and a terrible person.
It's easy to find "insiders" with negative things to say about politicians/former bosses.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/09/06/harris-veep-boss-management/
Yes, but it’s rarer to struggle to find *anybody* except sycophants on the order or Rudi Guliani who has anything good to say about you.
Also, it would surprise me not at all to learn Kamala Harris was a horrible person to work with. I was addressing your point about Trump.
Understood. What went right or wrong under a certain President is not entirely their doing. That makes it difficult to make broad claims and we end up with, not as bad as Biden equipping the Taliban military. Not starting new wars. Attempting diplomacy with N Korea and Russia where the situation is dangerous at the moment, notice how it ends up a comparison. But the results are complex.
Sooner or later, someone is going to call America's bluff. Our arrogant, we can always nuke you ignores MAD and America's extreme vulnerability. We are closer to that now, but how much credit and blame goes to Trump or Biden alone?
I understand that you are not going to drop the Trump is worse thing and I'm certainly not trying to change your mind or disagree.
At this point if it was possible to compare the results and world situation at the end of a Trump and Harris Presidency with some sort of dual reality, I wouldn't be willing to bet my life savings on who gets the best result. Since I want what is best for my country and the world, I hope that whoever wins surprises the naysayers and does a good job and obtains the most beneficial result, even if it is in spite of themself, Not being a disaster might be the best we can hope for.
In the end, I will never cast a deciding vote or know that my opinion is best, so my thoughts are just conversation.
Don't always understand the points you try to make.
And often don't agree with what you're arguing when I do understand your view and your argument.
BUT DO APPRECIATE WHAT YOU WRITE ON THIS SITE, AND THE TONE, AND THE REASONING.
Haha, thanks, I think! If anything is ever unclear please feel free to let me know and I'll try to clarify.
I appreciate the offer, seriously.
Well-put as always, sir! Aside from the fact that Hillary Clinton frequently said the 2016 election was stolen, and hasn't recanted that as far as I know, your points are on point. Now if only we could hibernate for the next three weeks.
Hmm, fair point about Hillary, although I think she was doing/saying something quite different to Trump. Hillary won the popular vote in 2016 by something like 2 million votes if memory serves, so her feeling aggrieved about losing makes more sense.
And more to the point, she accepted the loss, gave her concession speech, which Trump still has yet to do, and didn't encourage a mob to try to overturn the results. These aren't small differences.
Democrats have gone a bit too far in accepting election results, IMHO. Al Gore should have been our 43rd President. The Supreme Court wronged the American Public in an unsurprising preemption of our rights. But for the sake of a peaceful transfer of power, he conceded instead of fostering a rageful mob.
Agreed.
Steve, I realize you wrote about false equivalency and it shines a light on a related issue.
Democrats can say little about Harris before they start talking about Trump. Trumpeters (not all Republicans are Trumpseters) say little about him before they start talking about Harris, or perhaps more commonly, Democrats in general. Ad homin vs policy.
I realize that the election is a deadly, for the world perhaps, game with winner and loser where the world may be the big loser, but it is noteworthy that there is so little non-empty platitude talk about policy of their own without turning it into what's wrong with them.
A big why s/he would be a disaster, rather than why I would be a better choice than a panhandler with a cardboard sign at a stoplight.
Would we be better served by less "we're not equivalent" and more, this is how I/we would be good for humanity" and not just because "s/he's worse!"?
Or is it impossible when talking about politicians and government to not end up with who is worse?
Problem is, you don't get media attention for being reasonable and policy-focused, and your opponent is busily attacking you. So, whattaya gonna do?