There’s a very simple explanation for why Democrats didn’t get a “better” stimulus deal. They are negotiating with a political party that is indifferent to human suffering.
The reason Republicans finally agreed to a COVID relief deal is to help Perdue and Loeffler ... so they can maintain control of a legislative body to which they are committed to doing nothing but stopping Democratic efforts to help their fellow citizens
Blaming Democrats for not getting a better deal when Senate Republicans have opposed and stymied more stimulus for seven months is maddening. Democrats are far from perfect but this isn’t on them.
So earlier I did a tweetstorm on the most useless musical acts ... and someone asked about underrated. So here’s a few:
- Lucinda Williams. Yes people love her but she is one of the best female songwriters and doesn’t get the adulation she deserves commensurate to her talent
“Car Wheels On A Gravel Road” is a desert island album. Her last record (made at age 65) is beautiful and vital work
- The Afghan Whigs “Black Love” is one of the best albums of the 90s.
- Wilco is dismissed as Dad Rock. They are a top 5 all-time American band. Also Summerteeth is better than YHF
- Roberta Flack ... she is extraordinary and largely ignored.
This map is dumb but from a narrow political perspective - and assuming a finite set of resources - it’s not wrong to argue that Democrats should, aside from GA and NC, focus their resources elsewhere
Personally I don’t like a strategy of ignoring whole swaths of the country - for either party - but this election suggests that outside NC and GA Democrats aren’t getting traction in the South
I should add Texas to this list. It’s still a red state but there are clearly opportunities for Democrats there
Besides the obvious civ-mil reasons why Gen. Austin is a bad pick, there's a larger issue: his background doesn't lend itself to someone who would make for a good Sec Def
He's been a highly effective battlefield commander, which is not really good training for a civilian position like Sec Def. It's true he was Cent Com commander but running a military organization is very different than running a civilian bureaucracy like the Pentagon
To be an effective Sec Def you need to have strong administrative and political skills. You need to have distance from the military. You need to bring a civilian mindset to the job. Austin really has none of those qualities.
Ok so along with my good friend @mahler3 I’m rewatching Contagion ... so prepare for some live tweeting. For those who want to follow along it’s on HBO
There are so many great subtle touches in this film about how the virus is spread ... the bowl of nuts for example that Paltrow is eating out of in the hotel bar
As bad as that Trump statement was, keep in mind that close to 70 million Americans voted for four more years of it
You want to talk about the divide in America? On any every news network, even Fox, pundits and analysts will eviscerate Trump for what he just said. Tens of millions of Americans who voted for him thought it was great.
I said earlier that the issue raised by this election is not that Democrats have a bad message or can't communicate with voters ... it's that tens of millions of voters are ok, even applauding, of the president's lying, corruption, and bats**t insanity. How do you fix that?