Eric Levitz wrote an interesting article over at New York magazine, The Bernie vs Warren Debate We Need. It’s a good article and worth checking out. The gist of it is that people are making too much of their differences because the existing Democratic Party (to say nothing of the Republicans) will limit what they are able to do. So the debate should be about how good Sanders and Warren will be on foreign affairs and economic regulation — two things they can do on their own. What I like about it is that he recognizes that both candidates have potential advantages and that these need to be debated. What I’ve seen is mostly Sanders supporters claiming he is in all ways better than Warren, and Warren supporters ignoring the whole debate because she’s winning.

Levitz was on Majority Report Thursday. Sam Seder tried to be very even-handed in this. But he brought up an analogy that I think is telling. (I don’t want to spend the time to find the exact quote; it’s a 42-minute interview.) Roughly, it’s this: “It’s like Bernie can go 70 mph, Warren can go 60 mph, and Biden can go 30 mph. But it doesn’t matter because the speed limit is 50 mph.” Levitz more or less agreed with this. I don’t think he should have.

Stop Begging the Question

The article wouldn’t be that interesting if it were just, “Bernie’s better but it doesn’t matter.” That wouldn’t be something we should talk about. What Levitz is saying is that Sanders has better policies on foreign affairs. What’s that going to do for us if he’s president? Similarly, Elizabeth Warren has much more aggressive ideas for taming the domestic economy. What’s that going to do for us if she’s president? The point is that we should be discussing this and not just assuming that “Sanders is better” or “Warren is more popular.”

So Seder’s analogy begs the question. It assumes that Sanders is better. A more accurate analogy of Levitz’s argument is that Sanders can drive faster on freeways and Warren can drive faster in the city. Are we looking at the next administration driving more on the freeway or in the city? Discuss.

In conversations with Sanders supporters, Warren’s abilities to reform the regulatory framework through executive action are simply ignored. Nowhere do you see Michael Brooks doing segments on Sanders’ timidity when it comes to taking on big business. I understand that there is an argument to be made that the US is such a pernicious force in the world that foreign affairs are all that matter. But you need to make that argument. And the truth is, it isn’t an easy sell.

Engage Substantively — Not With Talking Points

I’m not naive enough to think that any of this will change minds. Those going in as Sanders supporters will still find that he is the candidate to support. The same is true of Warren supporters. But there are some important things here.

First, it means that Warren supporters and Sanders supporters can engage with each other on an honest level rather than caricaturing the other candidate. Second, it will allow supporters of one candidate to see the other in a more nuanced way. Third, it won’t lead to the creation of a bunch of talking points for the Trump campaign to use against whoever wins the primary.

I’m mostly talking to Warren supporters here. The truth is, we’ve lost the battle with Sanders supporters. And the worst time to talk to them is when the Sanders campaign is struggling.

I want to get Warren supporters on board with this now when she is ahead. Anything could happen. It might turn out that Elizabeth Warren has been having an extramarital affair with a Marine. (Note: actual smear campaign!) Sanders could pull out in front and win the whole thing. And I really don’t want to see Warren supporters do to Sanders what Sanders supporters are now doing to Warren.

Because I will fight just as hard against that.

Several people have mentioned that Rudy Giuliani sure isn’t the guy he once was. This is wrong. He’s exactly the guy he always was. It’s just that in the past, people (the media in particular) gave him a pass. He’s definitely the vile and corrupt man you see on Fox News and CNN. But there’s no reason to think this has changed.

Early Rudy

Just look at his move from Democrat to independent to Republican. He had been a Democrat — the default for someone from New York. But when he got in good with the Ford administration, he became an independent. Then, pretty much the moment that Reagan was elected president, Giuliani became a Republican. This almost certainly was due to an offer to work in the Reagan administration. The one thing you can definitely say about Giuliani is that he always does what is best for himself — as much as a man as silly and ignorant as he knows what’s best for him.

Under Reagan, Giuliani oversaw the placement of Haitian refugees. Those that weren’t put in concentration camps were sent back to Haiti because, Giuliani claimed, they weren’t actual refugees. It was the same then as now. He claimed they were just fleeing poverty and thus had no claim on asylum. This is one of countless examples that make me bristle when I hear someone say that Trump is notably worse than previous Republicans.

For all that period, Rudy Giuliani made public racist comments even while claiming that it was outrageous that anyone called him racist. And his later tough-on-crime stance — including his “broken windows” and stop-and-frisk policies are all a part of that. He ran what was basically an authoritarian administration as governor of New York. And it is not at all clear this even resulted in reduced crime.

Looking at the whole of Giuliani’s mayorship, it’s hard not to see it as a blueprint for Trump. It’s not just its base authoritarianism. It’s the belligerent tone, explicit endorsement of police violence, and comically obvious corruption.

Mayor of the World

Like most Americans, I watched a lot of news after 9/11. And I was shocked about how much good press Giuliani got. It’s not that there was anything wrong with what he was doing. It’s just that there wasn’t anything to applaud. The banalest behavior was held up as something great. It was a clear example of how people will find something to applaud about you if they are determined to applaud you.

The worst example of this was when David Letterman came back on Late Show. I wanted to vomit when I heard it. And it hasn’t aged well:

The Narrative

Yet this is the narrative that was formed. And it reached its apex with the Time Person of the Year. They named him “Mayor of the World.” At the time, I thought it was just an indication of how craven journalists have become the last few decades.

Time spent decades noting that “Man/Person of the Year” was not necessarily laudatory. It was clear, at least from an American perspective, that the person of the year should have been Osama bin Laden. But I do understand: Americans are so ignorant and closed-minded that they would have lost it over that choice.

Just before 9/11, the narrative in New York was that Giuliani was a racist authoritarian. His career was effectively over. The attacks that day were better for Giuliani than they were even for George W Bush.

But why Rudy Giuliani?! Well, because that was the narrative. It could have been anyone. But why not the mayor of New York? And all the bad things about him were totally in line with the way that Americans was thinking and doing.

It doesn’t change things that Rudy Giuliani was still an awful person and that the narrative was just that: a narrative — a convenient fiction to be used by society. It had nothing to do with the man himself.

Death of a Narrative

The narrative didn’t die overnight after people realized that Giuliani was ranting, “I will be the hero!” No. After the crisis, Giuliani destroyed the narrative like you lose a chess game: move by move, inch by inch.

During the calm, things slowly came out that showed Giuliani wasn’t such a great protector of New York. It truly is amazing that again and again people mistake tough-talk with competence. He was widely cited for taking terrorism seriously before 9/11. But this just wasn’t true. His planning for a terrorist attack was pathetic. Most notably, it included putting the Office of Emergency Management command center in the World Trade Center over the objections of people who actually knew about this kind of stuff.

He was one of the worst Republicans when it came to explicitly politicize 9/11. And in this, no one can be surprised by who he is today. For example, he said, “We had no domestic attacks under Bush. We’ve had one under Obama.”[1]

One of Joe Biden’s best-remembered lines is, “Rudy Giuliani — there’s only three things he mentions in a sentence: a noun, a verb, and 9/11.” What was particularly crushing about the line was that it was true. If you look at his campaign for president, that is how he spoke. He tied everything to 9/11.

Rudy Hasn’t Changed

There is much more, of course. His history in the private sector over the last decade has been awful — including help to Purdue to keep selling Oxycontin. But the point is that for as long as most people have been aware of him, Rudy Giuliani has been terrible. What he’s been doing for Trump is nothing new.

[1] To be fair, this used to be common. Conservatives (publicly and in private discussions) would say, “Bush kept us safe!” The same people who just couldn’t shut up about 9/11 somehow forgot that it happened while Bush was president. And even if you give Bush a mulligan on that, there were many other deadly attacks.

If you were to read my Twitter feed you might get the impression that I am against Bernie Sanders for president. This is not the case. I was a firm supporter of him in 2016 and I still support him now. It is just that I support Warren more.

Part of this is simply that I think she is the right candidate for this time. And I have been a supporter of hers for many years. But the bigger issue is simply practical. For what I consider mostly ridiculous reasons, the establishment of the Democratic Party hates Sanders. And I am certain that if he were to become the nominee, they would indeed destroy the party in order to save it.

But I know the counter to this. Sanders supporters say that young people and other disaffected voters will come out in droves to support Sanders if he is the nominee. When has this ever worked? Remember in 2016, there were lots of people claiming they didn’t need to vote for Clinton because people would rise up against a Trump presidency. How’s that going?

I don’t doubt that if Sanders is the Democratic nominee, some people will vote who wouldn’t normally. I suspect that if he is on the ballot, the Peace and Freedom Party will see a lot fewer votes for president. But none of this is going to make up for the apathy — and worse — of the Democratic establishment.

But if Sanders gets the nomination or his campaign simply takes off, I will be a full-throated supporter. But there are a lot of Sanders supporters who make it hard to love his candidacy.

Warren the Neoliberal!

I constantly see people referring to Warren as a neoliberal. This is simply not true. And it has made me think there is more truth to Jonathan Chait’s claim that the term has no meaning. How is the candidate pushing a wealth tax and a breakup of large corporations a neoliberal?

In truth, on a policy basis, there is very little that differentiates Warren from Sanders. The more thoughtful Sanders supporters focus on his rhetoric. And I’ll admit that I too prefer his rhetoric.

However, it is something that inclines me against him. It annoys me to hear him refer to himself as a Democratic Socialist when he clearly is not. He, like Warren, is a Social Democrat. That is to say: they are both just traditional liberals.

My political opinions are a little complicated to boil down to a single word. However, the only word that even comes close is “socialist.” That is to say, I am an actual socialist. So I’m not keen on people taking the label when it doesn’t actually apply to them. And it annoys me even more when people slam Warren for saying she’s a capitalist to her bones when Sanders embodies that principle even as he claims to be a socialist.

Warren the Republican!

I’ve also seen a lot of criticisms of Warren for once being a Republican. This is very strange to me. What happened to loving the sinner reborn?

What’s more, look at the history of the candidates. Over the years, Warren has moved steadily to the left for concrete policy reasons. Sanders, on the other hand, has moved to the right in order to accumulate political power in the United States.

I am absolutely not criticizing Sanders for this. This is the nature of politics. But it definitely goes against the narrative that Sanders is somehow pure and Warren is just a capitalist apologist.

The Practical Side of a Sanders Presidency

What is it that people think is going to happen if Sanders becomes president? He will not have as much political power in the Democratic party as Warren will. Are we to believe that the people will rise up and demand that the Democrats get behind him? This is absurd — very much like the claim that the people would rise up against Trump. I have yet to hear a compelling case for how Sanders will accomplish his goals.

(Of particular concern is Sanders’ claim that he won’t get rid of the filibuster. All his supporters say in reference to this is that he’s lying for tactical reasons. I find this unlikely. Most people tell the truth while running for president.)

There is no mass movement behind Sanders. In fact, if you look at polling numbers, you will see that he is largely benefiting exactly the same way that Joe Biden is. He has name recognition and people remember him from the 2016 election. Yes, he has a hard-core base of support, but most of his support is soft and comes from low-information voters.

Sadly, what is most likely to happen if Sanders became president is it the Democratic Party would largely shut down his agenda. In the end, he would be seen as an inefficient president and it would be another blight on the term socialism.

Where Sanders Shines

There is one area where I much prefer Sanders to Warren. In terms of international affairs, Sanders would be notably better. Sadly most of the things that I would love in that case would be extremely unpopular among the American people. So it would represent at best a short reprieve from some of the worst excesses of American foreign policy.

I don’t mean for this to sound negative towards Sanders. As I said, I liked him very much. I will be proud to have him as my president. But I’m pretty tired of the pro-Sanders argument that there is some kind of categorical difference between Warren and Sanders when there absolutely is not.

Recently, Michael Brooks on The Majority Report dismissed Warren’s wealth tax by noting that Sanders version is better. Well, first I doubt Sanders would even have pitched a wealth tax if it hadn’t been for Warren. Also, Warren’s wealth tax is actually bigger than Sanders. [This was written before Sanders came out with an actual wealth tax. -FM] But this is typical of a particular kind of Sanders supporter who just “knows” that Sanders is better than Warren without having any actual evidence. (Brooks has become absolutely hysterical in his hatred of Warren. It’s sad to see a smart guy lose it the way he has over the last couple of months.)

Sanders Needs to Up His Game

To some extent, I think the ridiculousness coming from some of Sanders’ most committed followers is due to the fact that his campaign is languishing. The threat of Warren has caused it to make some positive changes. But Sanders himself seems like he’s coasting

When you’re running for president, you really do need to excite people. And the truth is on the most important issues facing us, Warren is exciting people. Sanders is acting like he’s still running against one other candidate in 2016. Even worse: he’s acting like he’s the frontrunner.

Moving Forward Together

I’ll be happy if either Sanders or Warren gets the nomination. I have my preference (obviously), but that’s never made me attack the other.

My big concern these days is what happens if Warren takes off and Sanders crumbles. What is going to happen to the Sanders true believers? Is this going to be an even more absurd repeat of 2016 where they find every reason imaginable to explain why they “just can’t support Warren”? They certainly aren’t educating themselves about Warren except to cherry-pick anything they can find to claim that she is just a neoliberal they can dismiss. They just see her as “Not Bernie Sanders” and that means she’s bad.

I don’t understand any of it. A lot of Sanders supporters who acted as I did in 2016 are now acting like Jimmy Dore. And it’s even worse because these same people would be thrilled by Warren if Sanders weren’t running. To me, it’s simple: if you are excited about Bernie Sanders and you can’t get excited about Elizabeth Warren there’s something wrong with you. And it works the same way the other way around. It’s just that I haven’t see Warren supporters who spend much of their time complaining about Sanders (although I’m sure they’re out there).

Right now, Sanders’ campaign is in trouble. It’s been treading water for far too long. And this is the fault of Sanders. Warren’s rise has not been at the expense of Sanders [Polls since this was written indicate that he is losing support to Warren -FM]. So if you really want Sanders to be president, work on rising him up, not tearing Warren down. The best that will come of that is President Joe Biden.

Update

I just heard Michael Brooks claiming, based on a Sander-supporter caller who mentions that Warren being a woman makes him feel more comfortable voting for her, that the case Warren supporters are making for her is her gender. I’ve never heard that. It certainly doesn’t have anything to do with why I support her. And I suspect it isn’t a case people are making for Warren but just another strawman to go with his cherry-picked issues. The main takeaway, however, is that Brooks has nothing by derision for Warren. If she becomes the nominee, all we are going to hear from him is, “Well, she’s better than Trump I suppose.” I don’t think he’ll go full Jimmy Dore, but I can’t rule it out.

Trump constantly embarrasses the US on the world stage. But that is nowhere as true as when he acts as Putin’s lap dog. This was on full display at the Group of Seven meeting last weekend. He not only begged to let Russia back into the group publicly, he did it in private too.

To our friends overseas, it must seem as though Americans elect presidents randomly. Sure, we occasionally elect someone like Obama, but that’s more than countered by the election of people like Trump. And Bush Jr. And Reagan. And Nixon. Really, you have to go back to Eisenhower to find a Republican president who isn’t an embarrassment for one reason or another. (Bush Sr wasn’t a fool; but he was a spook.)

Russia Isn’t a Major Economic Player

But it got me thinking. Why was Russia ever in the Group of Eight? China isn’t. And I think there’s a much better case to be made for China. The Group of Whatever is about economic development. China is the second-largest economy in the world. (The largest if you look at the economy based on purchasing power.) But I get why China is not included. I just don’t get why Russia ever way.

Let’s look at some economic data of the G7 along with Russian:

There are three countries not in the G7 that have higher GDPs. Of these, India has a very low per capita GDP. But both China and Brazil have per capita GDPs that are roughly the same as Russia’s. So why not them? I can’t determine any reason why Russia would be allowed in while these two wouldn’t. Must be a nuclear power? Then why not India or China? Must be a “free market” economy? Then why not India or Brazil (and let’s face it: China)?

It’s clear from the table above, that Russia really doesn’t fit into the Group of Whatever. It makes far more sense to include China.

Why Was Russia in the G8?

It seems clear that Russia was only allowed into the G8 because Boris Yeltsin was being rewarded for all his neoliberal changes to the Russian economy that screwed over the vast majority of Russian citizens. And given that this is partly to blame for the rise of Vladimir Putin, it makes a certain amount of internal logic to let Russian back in. But just because the Group of Whatever is a sham neoliberal project designed by the most powerful countries to keep everyone else down doesn’t mean the rest of us need to go along with it.

Russia is a two-bit economic power that only matters because of their nuclear arsenal. The group itself serves no ethical purpose as Russia’s previous inclusion shows.

Like most of us, I am sick of hearing, reading, or talking about Trump. Friends will ask if I’ve heard of the latest outrage he’s committed, and I’ll usually answer, “No.” What’s the point? It’ll either be bigoted, ignorant, dishonest, or utterly destructive to civilization’s future. Usually all of the above.

It’s standard-brand Republican politics, as practiced for at least 40 years, but with more boorishness. Trump’s fans love him for these things, and I have no interest in trying to discern their motives. Some sort of psychological disorder, no doubt, and not a particularly compelling one.

So I was overjoyed to recently read that Trump has been pestering aides with questions about whether the United States can buy Greenland. That’s the kind of amusing, harmless stupidity I hope for from Republican administrations. Like Bush II mispronouncing “nuclear” or Reagan telling Gorbachev that if aliens attacked Earth, America and the USSR would work together.

Even better were the responses of semi-sane people. The Guardian had a fun article quoting Greenlanders and Danes, both politicians and average citizens. (Greenland is self-governing, but still technically a protectorate of Denmark, which provides what military defense the island requires.) Their comments ranged from the sensible (“Why on Earth would anybody want to be an American colony?”) to incredulous (“It must be a joke!”). A member of Denmark’s “nationalist” (read: anti-immigrant) party said, “It is definitive proof that [Trump] has gone crazy.” Again, that’s the far-right, anti-immigrant party speaking.

Note to Danes: it’s not a joke, and he’s been crazy for a looooong time before this.

What the Danes Have Told Me

We have several old Danish friends. (When Mrs James left for college, her father developed empty-nest syndrome and had a series of exchange students; she’s stayed in touch with the ones she liked best.) One spent a few years living in Greenland, another is a communications specialist in the navy.

The com specialist has observed in the past that Denmark and every other nation with Arctic territory maintains a naval presence in the Arctic Ocean. “Basically,” she said, “we just sail around and let each other know we’re there.” Reduced thickness of sea ice has made it possible for oil companies to put oil rigs in places where, before, the ice would crush them like tinfoil. As some of the sites oil companies are interested in lie well offshore, the question comes up of whom has sovereignty over which international waters. “I like it when we sail up north,” she told us. “It’s not so damn hot.”

The man who lived in Greenland left because he broke up with his girlfriend there. Besides, he said, he was drinking too much. The largest town has 17,000 people, and in smaller ones it’s common to stock up goods for the winter before basically hunkering down. If one’s relationship is going sour, there really isn’t much else to do but drink. (Rationing would be key here.)

His response to Trump’s proposal was the simple text message “Why?!”

Seriously, Why Would America Want Greenland?

Several writers have addressed this question, with varying levels of seriousness. A columnist covering European affairs for Bloomberg actually typed about “reviving the market in sovereign territories, which once made America great.” Brian Kahn, usually a environmental writer for Gizmodo UK, said the idea was “plainly, batshit,” but addressed some of the possible geopolitical advantages (world’s largest supply of freshwater, mineral deposits under a melting ice sheet, military location, etc.) My favorite was by Matthew Walther at MSN, who noted that Greenland is essential territory in the boardgame Risk:

Right you are, sir. Yet, just to pretend, let’s look at the “serious” reasons one-by-one.

Seriously, These Reasons Make No Sense

Mineral deposits/oil reserves: Greenland does have these. So why would Denmark have any conceivable reason to sell? They’re a perfectly wealthy country, with a diversified economy (and a better standard of living than that of most Americans) — they don’t need our money. Their asking price would be well what the territory is worth and more; it’d be cheaper for us to just bomb some suffering nation and steal their stuff.

Strategic military location: we already have bases in Greenland. Denmark is part of NATO, as we are (for now). In fact, one of our planes once caught fire and crashed while carrying huge atomic bombs. The bombs didn’t go off (these near-misses have happened more often than most people know), but the crash spread toxic radiation over a wide area. Needless to say, Greenlanders were not pleased.

Besides, we’re not living in 1964, Dr. Strangelove days anymore, when B-52s were our primary nuclear delivery threat: we have submarines that can shoot missiles from anywhere, and ICBMs which can shoot missiles to everywhere. One decommissioned silo in South Dakota, now the Minuteman National Historic Site, features a giant blast door painted by USAF staffers to resemble a Domino’s Pizza box. The tagline: “Worldwide Delivery In 30 Minutes Or Less / Or Your Next One Is Free.”

That’s from a Cold-War era missile silo. I promise you today’s missiles go much faster.

Water: Neither Trump nor any other Republican cares remotely about America’s drinking water supply (ask Flint, Newark, etc). If most of the water on Earth gets poisoned, rich people will have access to the last good stuff.

What Trump Does Care About, Bigly

Once you count territorial possessions, the United States is Earth’s fourth-largest country, geographically, behind Russia, Canada, and China. Purchasing Greenland would make us a solid #2.

Would anyone really put such an idiotic motive past Trump? He wants the biggest military parade and biggest wall. He lies about having the biggest audiences and largest fortune and greatest electoral victory. (If Trump consciously lies, which I doubt; I suspect he thinks that whatever he thinks is true.) He’s said that the World Trade Center attacks made his Trump Tower the biggest building in downtown Manhattan. He brags about TV ratings and Twitter followers. Let’s not forget his ridiculously oversized neckties.

Maybe this is some kind of Freudian thing, or simply the twisted mindset of aspirationally rich people — keeping up with the Joneses taken to psychotic extremes. I don’t particularly care. Serial killers are far more interesting than rich people (and ultimately far less dangerous).

In any case, this explanation makes the most sense to me. So I’m officially calling it the best. And the biggest.

Charlie Pierce wrote:

“‘It’s hard. It’s really, really hard because my husband died by gun suicide,’ said Judy Schneider-Wallace, a former schoolteacher from Seattle.”

Okay, Pierce: bring it, you’ve already broken my heart past repair.

“She and her husband, Paul, were double victims of the economic collapse and of the financial-services vampires who both caused it and then profited by looting the lives they’d already ruined.”

No, Charlie! No more!

“They were in the process of renegotiating their mortgage with Wells Fargo, a process that brought grief to thousands of people across the country whose personal economies already were in tatters.”

Okay. I’m far past the point of being able to handle this.

“While they were wrestling with financial ruin, Paul shot himself to death on the first day of school.”

No. You cannot do that, Pierce. You cannot lead readers down that path to a place so gruesome and grim, even though it is the truth.

I would never do so. And that’s why I’m a baseball writer and Charlie Pierce is, funny names for politicians aside, a real writer. I don’t always agree with him, but does he ever leave pretenders like Chait or Yglesias in the damn dust?

My wife is good at talking to people and hearing their stories; it’s never been a thing I’m skilled at.

Ted Cruz said that the El Paso massacre was “a heinous act of terrorism and white supremacy.” This is representative of what I’ve seen throughout the day from conservatives. And I’ve seen a lot of liberals applaud what seems like a change coming from conservatives that used to believe these things only happened because of insanity.

But isn’t it obvious that calling this terrorism is just the newest way for conservatives to ignore the main problem that there are too many guns floating around?

After the Sandy Hook massacre, many on the left (including me) discussed the effect of mental illness and access to care. That’s because the shooter was, in fact, mentally ill. But conservatives quickly picked up on this idea. “The problem isn’t guns! It’s the mentally ill!”

In general, this narrative has worked with most mass shootings because most of the perpetrators end up dead — often at their own hands. It’s harder to do that in the case of the El Paso massacre because the perpetrator survived.

But it doesn’t matter whether you want to say that some guy started killing a bunch of people because he was insane, just bad, or a terrorist. Each of these cases reduces a systemic problem to one of bad actors. If you accept this idea then there is no point in trying to change the environment. Instead, you just have to get the bad actor.

We must speak clearly to combat evil in any form it takes. What we saw yesterday was a heinous act of terrorism and white supremacy. There is no place for this in El Paso, in Texas, or anywhere across our nation.

We are all Americans and we are all standing united with El Paso.

— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) August 4, 2019

Don’t Expect Change

If this causes any changes in the law, it will be around the edges. But even this is unlikely to happen. In a few days, after reporters stop asking politicians about this, the conservatives will go back the NRA line that universal background checks are one step from tyranny.

And even if we did get background checks, I wonder how much good it would do. Guns are widely available outside of legal channels. We are decades past the point where minor tinkering around the edges is going to do much good.

Not that I’m against trying. But like I said: nothing is going to change.

It’s bad to watch Ted Cruz and the rest of the conservatives in this country stonewalling against doing anything about gun violence. But it’s worse to watch that while the nation gives them credit for being so reasonable.

One thing I’ve learned over years of blogging (Coming up on our 10 year anniversary!) is that it is wrong to be vague about things you criticize. More than wrong, it’s boring. You see this all the time with conservatives. “Libtards are saying white men should be killed!” Really? Who is saying this? So I find it a little worrying that I say this: Matt Yglesias has been arguing for the Democrats to nominate Joe Biden.

I’ve been following Yglesias’ on Twitter and on The Weeds podcast. And he has this overarching idea that Elizabeth Warren is more popular than she should be and that the people who support her shouldn’t. And below all this is, I think, the idea that she can’t beat Trump. You know: because people don’t actually support her ideas. The people (as though Yglesias has any more of a clue what “the people” want than I do) just want to get rid of Trump and don’t actually want any structural reform of the American economic system.

For all I know, Matt Yglesias will vote for Elizabeth Warren. But he’s fond of the “hot take.” He loves to play the informed iconoclast. So I’m not arguing anything about what’s in his heart. But his “take” on Warren seems to be ill-advised.

Why Does Matt Yglesias Think Warren Will Lose?

Does he really think that people are going to choose to vote for Trump over Warren because of these policy issues? She’s talking about making structural changes to the economy when Trump is talking about nuclear war with Iran. I wonder how the American people will vote?!

But what really bugs me about this is that we have loads of political science data on this question. Unless 2020 is somehow completely different from every other election for almost 50 years, Trump will win or lose based on the economy.

And it’s worse than that. The economy is the most important thing. Pretty much everything else runs against Trump. If the economy slows down, Trump is toast. It doesn’t matter what Democrat runs against him.

On the other hand, if the economy heats up to a point that none of us can even imagine now, no Democrat will be able to beat him.

Remember: my simple political science model predicted that Trump would win in 2016. Trump’s election to president doesn’t change the underlying political science.

Why Has Matt Yglesias Forgotten Political Science?

This political science is exactly the kind of stuff that Vox writers live and breath. So why does Yglesias seem to have forgotten it all?

I suspect that it all comes down to him playing the part of a journalist rather than living the part — you know, where he actually looks for the truth?

There’s not much point in focusing on political science since it doesn’t change much over time. Instead, focus on your own ideas about electability!

And that’s what Yglesias is doing. He’s far too smart to fall into the trap of thinking “electable” means “white man.” But he isn’t so smart that he can’t fall into the same trap with a more sophisticated notion of electability.

But really: it isn’t that sophisticated. Despite all evidence, he’s assuming that people vote based upon policy rather than what we know: people base their policy ideas on the candidate they vote for.

This is sad to see because, despite it all, Matt Yglesias is still an interesting and insightful writer. His problem is simply that he, like far lesser journalist, is being blinded by the narrative he has landed on.

The UK’s new prime minister will be announced on Tuesday. And it will make absolutely no difference at all to anyone.

Even if Jeremy Hunt had a chance of winning, it would not change the political situation one bit.

Not that he has a chance, of course. Everyone knows Boris Johnson will become prime minister despite being totally unfit for the job.

Brexit continues to be a time-sucking, resource-leeching distraction for the entire country. Because of Brexit, UK campaigners and politicians cannot direct appropriate attention to climate change, the aftermath of the Grenfell Tower disaster, or the desperate lack of funding for public services.

Businesses have no idea whether they will still be importing goods in four months’ time. Even the people who voted for Brexit and want it passionately now say, “Just get it over with!”

If I had to bet on an outcome, I’d say we are in for at least ten more years of not knowing what will happen.

There is No Brexit Agreement That Will Pass

Parliament will not pass the agreement with the EU that Theresa May negotiated.

When she attempted to arrange a compromise within the UK parliament to get it through, she was immediately ousted by her own party, which shows just how little room there is for movement. It just won’t happen.

In parallel, the EU will not renegotiate her agreement. It has wasted many months attempting to negotiate with hapless British ministers, and presumably has no desire to prolong the agony.

Besides, the agreement is just the first in a very long, protracted process of debating and negotiating with the UK, so it wants to get to stage two as soon as possible.

The UK’s Three Options

So without an agreement that can be passed by Parliament, or constrained by the EU, the UK has three options.

1. Leave without a deal. This is essentially where all laws governing trade and travel cease to exist overnight. Some planning has been done, but nowhere near enough to prevent a massive economic shock. The other main issue with this is the island of Ireland, which is then almost impossibly split by a land border that is currently invisible.

   The border weaves through people’s houses and fields of livestock; one family home has its front door in one country and its back door in the other. It would have to be somehow marked and patrolled, undoing the fragile peace facilitated by the Good Friday agreement, which currently allows freedom of movement and choice of nationality.

2. Cancel Brexit altogether. The UK can revoke its application to leave the EU without EU agreement, but it cannot unilaterally postpone the decision. So canceling is really the only guaranteed way to halt the process without having to seek anyone else’s permission.

3. Have another vote. A prime minister with time and inclination could re-run the referendum now that we are further down the line. Of course, Boris Johnson has neither the time nor the inclination.

   I’d love to believe that this provides an easy way forward. But there’s nothing stopping either side from lying or cheating, because the laws on that are the same as they were last time. If anything, the loopholes are just going to be more obvious now, and the campaigns more ruthless, because both sides have had a practice run.

In a hypothetical second vote, the remain side could expect — at best — a slight swing in their favor. This is hardly going to settle anything, although it might fuel the compromise position for some sort of half-in, half-out option that pleases nobody.

I personally think the first vote should have been voided once the massive illegal overspending came to light. But that opportunity is long gone.

Sinn Féin protest against a hard border post-Brexit.

It’s All About the Conservatives… Again

Boris Johnson, the man who will likely win on Tuesday, is unconcerned about the outcome of Brexit. The Conservative Party likes the noises he makes on Brexit, mainly because it has new competition: the Brexit Party.

For those who lost interest in Brexit many months ago, you may have missed the bit when Nigel Farage set up the Brexit Party Limited — a public company — after failing to be elected as an MP for Ukip seven times.

Along with his rebrand comes a rather appropriate “optimization” of what being a political party actually means in Brexit Britain; the Brexit Party has no manifesto, and takes untraceable donations via PayPal.

(One of its MEPs, David Bull, recently complained that he had to travel to Strasbourg to do his job as an MEP on his first day, having presumably failed to look up the location of the office before applying.)

The Conservative Party is rapidly losing ground to the Brexit Party because Farage wants to get Brexit over with, and doesn’t care what happens during or afterward. This is fitting, because a very large proportion of the electorate feel much the same, as does — Hey! — Boris Johnson.

The New PM Cannot Solve Brexit

On Tuesday, the new prime minister will be faced with exactly the same shitty situation the old one was faced with, but with less time to do something about it. (The EU warned the Conservative party not to waste time; the Conservatives know that wasting time is the only thing keeping them in power.)

To find its way out of this mess, the UK will need to do something that it so far has failed to do. It will need to look back at the reasons Brexit came about: inequality, an outdated voting system that doesn’t represent left or right adequately, and a generation that enjoys the workers’ rights and benefits of EU membership without really being clear on how they were won.

Of course, the fact that various Conservative politicians have part-time jobs with prominent right-wing newspapers plays a part in this mess as well.

Right now, the only positive outcome I could hope for from any of this would be a modernization of the voting system in the UK. That way, at least voters would be better represented in normal Elections, more able to have their voices heard without fear of a “wasted” vote, and less likely to move to extremes to be counted. And — like in Germany — I’d like to see a total ban on referendums.

If someone were to head to the farthest visible galaxy, it would take 13.3 billion years traveling at the speed of light to get there. Obviously, there is not yet the means to accomplish such a trip, but this scenario gives us an idea of the vast scale of the universe.

We live within this unfathomable space on the outskirts of the Milky Way Galaxy in a solar system on a small lonely planet that is currently our only home. Earth is effectively an island, and, like all islands, it has limited resources.

Unfortunately, humans have been depleting these resources. In some ways, it is done directly, such as by razing entire forests and all the flora and fauna that exist within them.

Indirectly it is done by pulling out carbon-rich decomposed plants and animals in the form of coal, oil and gas from deep within the earth so they can be burned for energy, releasing greenhouse gases. This creates the insulating blanket that is causing the planet to rapidly heat up and is leading to detrimental and far-reaching consequences that affect many aspects of life.

Coral Bleaching

When I was in college in the late 1980s, one of my biology professors discussed a relatively new and very concerning phenomenon, coral bleaching, which is what happens when coral-producing polyps expel the algae living inside them.

The problem with this is that algae provide 90% of the nutrition for coral. Without algae, coral dies, and when coral dies it can lead to the destruction of many ocean ecosystems. Coral polyps do so much. They provide habitat for over a million species, food and jobs for humans, potential medicines for life-threatening illnesses, and protection for coastal areas.

At the time I was taking the aforementioned class, no one knew what was causing the coral bleaching. Research had begun, however, and scientists have since learned that it is due to a rise in ocean temperatures caused by the accumulation of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, which is, again I add, the result of human activity.

Ocean Acidification

Another very troubling matter is associated with too much carbon in the atmosphere: ocean acidification.

Oceans have been doing a decent job of absorbing carbon from the air — about 25% of it — but this makes water more acidic, and the way it affects shellfish is particularly worrisome because acid corrodes their protective calcium carbonate shells. This has been causing many mollusks and crustaceans to die.

Sometimes shells are unable to form at all, so these creatures do not even make it to adulthood. Entire populations of shellfish are suffering, and that is spilling over and detrimentally affecting the animals that eat them. The decimation of these creatures is also extremely problematic for people who rely on the shellfish industry for their livelihoods.

We’re in This Together

The examples I have mentioned are just two among many in which the use of fossil fuels is having far-reaching and negative consequences for the planet. It is like humans are playing a game of Jenga with nature. We are taking pieces out one by one, and at some point, the tower will come down.

No species lives in isolation. Any we can name is tethered in some way to at least one other species. When one is adversely affected, others are adversely affected as well. In 50 years some of us will not be here, but our children and grandchildren, nieces and nephews, and that 6-year old down the street, hopefully, will be.

They will have to live with the horrible fallout from our actions if we are unwilling to change.

At the risk of facing critical responses from readers, I believe most of us can do better. I promise to do better, to buy less, reuse and recycle more, and use what I already have.

Additionally, we can all help in a very easy and practical way by writing a letter, emailing, or calling our politicians and voicing our concerns.

HR 763

Specifically, we can contact Rep Katie Hill [or your own representative], asking her to co-sponsor HR 763, the Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act. This is a bill that will effectively help to combat climate change by rapidly reducing the excess greenhouse gas emissions warming the planet. It is also supported by many well-respected financial experts because it will be good for the economy.

If it is for the sake of future generations, I feel these are small things we must do.

Kim is a member of the Santa Clarita Chapter of Citizens’ Climate Lobby.