I honestly have no idea what this means …

https://twitter.com/mattyglesias/status/1972043712869081259

I have even less idea what this means, but as best I can surmise a lot of political pundits have convinced themselves that a) policy matters (it generally doesn’t) and b) if they say “expand the map” enough times it’ll magically solve the Democratic Party’s problems

https://twitter.com/mattyglesias/status/1972044012300497208

One of the strange things about the argument made by @ezraklein, @AJentleson, @mattyglesias, and others that Dems need to moderate their policies and expand the Senate map is that it oddly ignores how remarkably successful Dems are in winning statewide races in swing states 🧵 Swing states offer a test case for how successful the two parties are in places where a) they aren't swimming against the tide of partisanship & b) there is a closely divided electorate. Also, it tells us how effective the two parties are at winning over the political center

For Truth & Consequences, I did a deep dive on @Catalist_US's 2024 exit poll data, and the results are surprising.

One of Catalist's major data points, that Harris did well among consistent, highly engaged voters, is very good news for Democrats' near-term political prospects. Highly engaged and consistent voters are more likely to vote in non-presidential elections, and Harris's strong performance with this cohort suggests Democrats could do very well in the 2026 midterms.

Just to underscore the audaciousness of this grift - the “Trump Bible” is 20 TIMES more expensive than other bibles available online AND Oklahoma is requesting 55,000 bibles, which is nearly 30 percent more than the number of classroom teachers in the state

https://twitter.com/grahamdavida/status/1842191295256908112

There's another amazingly corrupt element to this grift. Most Oklahoma school districts have said they don't intend to request bibles because state academic standards don't require their use ... so most of these bibles won't ever show up in a classroom oklahoman.com/story/news/edu…

Lots of people are analogizing Biden’s withdrawal to LBJ’s withdrawal in 1968 … they are very, very different situations. 🧵 When LBJ announced his departure from the race on March 31, 1968 no one saw it coming. There’d been virtually no speculation that LBJ might drop out and only a handful of people knew his plans before he announced them. There were no trial balloons.

Just a quick lesson in media literacy & what I suspect is the WH's near-term strategy.

I always counsel people to pay less attention to a leak's content and instead ask why/who leaked a story.

Here's why I assume this leak was engineered by the WH🧵
cnn.com/2024/07/03/pol…

https://twitter.com/speechboy71/status/1808546261458633023

CNN says Biden "has privately acknowledged that the next stretch of days are critical to whether he can save his reelection bid for president."

Why would the WH leak a story that feeds the narrative that Biden might drop out?

This letter signed by journalism professors demanding that the NYT re-examine its 12/28 article chronicling the sexual assaults that took place on October 7 is as misinformed as it is shameful.

Every person who signed it should be embarrassed 🧵washingtonpost.com/documents/adc3… First, the letter ignores the multiple reports and journalistic accounts that back up the Times' reporting. That includes a UN report ... un.org/sexualviolence…

Yesterday, @TheAtlantic published my piece on October 7 rape denialism ... and there are a few points I want to highlight.

The first is that, contrary to the skeptics and denialists -- widespread sexual violence took place on October 7.
theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/… The Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel found "Hamas’s attack included brutal sexual assaults carried out systematically & deliberately against Israeli civilians and "sadistic practices aimed at intensifying the degree of humiliation and terror." gov.il/BlobFolder/new…

Ok, time for some game theory ... for @ezraklein @NateSilver538 @DamonLinker and others who continue to argue that Biden should drop out of the 2024 race. What happens next? 🧵 If Biden withdraws the overwhelming likelihood is that he endorses Kamala Harris for president. Why? It would show loyalty to his running mate, ensure Biden's legacy, and, even more important, would block a divisive nomination fight.

In this exchange, @RepThomasMassie says, "there's never been a school shooting in a school that allows teachers to carry."

I guess it depends on how one defines a teacher, but in the Parkland shooting, there was an armed officer present. He hid as 17 people were killed
THREAD

https://twitter.com/CBSNews/status/1641432681123594240

As far as shootings at schools where teachers carry weapons ... we don't know. That information isn't readily available. But very few teachers carry guns in schools. The last estimate in 2018 put the number at 2.6% of schools. nytimes.com/2022/07/31/us/…

It's poorly written and has Trump's usual weird capitalization issues, but it is also a pretty compelling argument against a DeSantis presidential bid The one thing I'll say in DeSantis's defense, he went to great lengths to kill as many Floridians as possible from COVID by opening up the state too soon ... seems unfair for Trump to attack him over it

Ron DeSantis went to Iowa and never talked about the economy, jobs, or inflation. Instead, he railed against Disney, CRT, Fauci, DEI, COVID vaccines, and illegal immigration. It's emblematic of a political party out of touch with the American people.
thedailybeast.com/ron-desantis-i… He said that Florida would look to pass laws to protect people against "woke banks" and said he would ban Zuckerbucks, which is an issue so far down the conservative fever swamp I had to look it up.

I hate to be that guy ... but the more I read @peterbakernyt's piece on Ben Barnes, John Connally and the secret mission to interfere in the 1980 election, the more it doesn't quite add up. In particular, these paragraphs (THREAD) There are two things that jump out ... first, why is there not more info about this three-hour meeting with Casey? It's the crucial link between Connally and the Reagan camp, and yet there's so clear smoking gun quote from Casey -- or not much info on what they discussed

So this is a useful thread and Frum points out correctly that there’s no evidence in this article that Connally’s trip influenced the Iranians.

But as I wrote about on the Nixon campaign’s efforts to lobby S. Vietnam to reject a potential peace deal in ‘68 … it doesn’t matter

https://twitter.com/davidfrum/status/1637206506700406790

As in the Reagan/Iran situation, there's no direct evidence that Nixon was involved in the efforts to lobby the South Vietnam leadership (there's lots of evidence that his campaign manager John Mitchell was involved).

This is kind of a strange argument in that even now -- after the pandemic has largely ended -- about half the country supports vaccine requirements for businesses, federal workers, and schools

https://twitter.com/dwallacewells/status/1636822650931625984

Even more striking is that these numbers are happening even though less than 20& of Americans consider COVID a severe health risk.

One more point on President's Day: FDR, Lincoln, and Washington were the three best presidents. But I actually don't think it's all that close. FDR clearly the GOAT -- won World War 2, got America out of the Great Depression, created the post-war international system ... ... created the modern welfare state, changed the role of government in the lives of the American people, and was also an incredibly effective and successful politician. We're still living in FDR's America.

For President's Day: the reality of the American presidency is that most American presidents were either mediocre or bad. 🧵msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-… After the first 5 or 6, until the 20th century) there's one great American president (Lincoln), a couple of not bad (Polk, maybe Grant), and a whole lot of meh.

So the NYT letter writers on trans bias have Issued an update ... and it makes an interesting claim: that there is a "well-documented complaint of editorial bias detailed in our letter." Let's take a look. nytletter.com The letter makes three claims re: @emilybazelon's long NYT piece on gender therapy: her use of the term "Patient Zero" vilified transness, she misidentified Grace-Lidinsky-Smith (whose name is misspelled) & multiple sources have expressed regret about talking to Bazelon.

For all the talk about the Sox screwing up on Xander Bogaerts ... it's worth asking what the hell the Padres are thinking? Of the last four World Series Champions all had a fairly similar strategy -- build from within. Not spending tons of $$ on FAs: 2022 Astros: Highest paid player, Justin Verlander, acquired in a trade. No high-price free agents. Best players, Altuve, Bregman, Alvaraz ... home grown.

2021 Braves: Highest paid player, Freeman -- $22m, home-grown. Highest paid FA: Charlie Morton, $15m.

This is a somewhat obvious point, BUT due to broad int'l sanctions on Russia (and the likely fact she was arrested to give Moscow a bargaining chip), the US had very little leverage in securing the freedom of Brittany Griner. Hard to imagine a "better deal" was possible ... ... when a country is willing to act in such an unethical and immoral manner (and arrest private citizens in order to secure some material advantage), the "good" actor doesn't have much choice but to give in to the hostage taker or allow the hostage to remain imprisoned

In light of the House passing the Respect for Marriage Act, re-upping my 2015 piece on perhaps the most courageous political moment I've ever seen -- Sen. Chuck Robb's Senate floor speech opposing the Defense of Marriage Act yahoo.com/news/the-speec… Robb's political courage on same-sex marriage likely helped cost him his Senate seat in what was then still-red Virginia. As for why he did it? Robb “had no personal connection to gay people" ... he did it because he believed anti-gay discrimination was wrong. Period