Item one: Sometimes you can just feel the conventional wisdom changing |
The political conventional wisdom is hard to define sometimes. Usually it’s one of those things that’s just there, like your body temperature. You feel it but don’t notice it. And then, bam, you feel hot, you get the chills, and that’s the moment you know you’re getting sick. Something has shifted, and suddenly you notice this thing you rarely think about. That’s how this week felt with regard to the conventional wisdom. A week ago, Donald Trump was the clear favorite to win in November, and of course he may yet—the polls are close and will remain so. But also, a week ago, Trump had a lot of wind in his sails coming off his smashing Iowa win, and Joe Biden was a doddering old man with a mixed-at-best economic record. There was no huge sea change this week. But there’s also no question that those scripts started to flip, in two important ways. First and most important, Trump is now the one doddering his way toward dementia. He has been for a while, but the Nikki-Nancy moment, and Nikki Haley’s subsequent attack on Trump, finally forced the media to make Trump’s mental state into a running narrative. The column I wrote Monday about this did monster traffic, which I note not to boast but by way of observing that the readership means that a lot
of people were obviously thinking the same thing. On Morning Joe, cable’s most influential show in setting the conventional wisdom, they’ve been just merciless about Trump’s addled brain. The Biden campaign put together a very funny ad mocking Trump. And over the rest of the week, Le Grand Orange (apologies, Rusty!) did not disappoint. There was that nutso social media binge against E. Jean Carroll—37 posts in two hours, Wednesday night. Then there was his ridiculous testimony at the Carroll defamation trial, where he was on the stand for three minutes and managed to defy the judge’s instructions twice. Then there was his absurd whining Thursday as he left the courtroom, repeating three times, "This is not America." No, asshole, this is actually the best version of America. A courtroom is the one place where your lies and slander don’t fly.
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Trump’s brain is turning into Jell-O before our eyes. No, not just Jell-O, but one of those ’60s Jell-O molds your mother (or grandmother) made, with cottage cheese and fruit and chunks of canned tuna and olives and a few mystery ingredients for good measure. And it’s not like there’s any chance he’s going to be pulling himself together. The pressure is building, and fast. This month, two judges, Lewis Kaplan in the Carroll case and Arthur Engoron in the fraud case, will announce the size of the damage awards they want Trump and his businesses to pay in those cases. Carroll seeks $10 million. New York Attorney
General Letitia James seeks $370 million in the fraud case. Neither judge seems especially seduced by Trump’s alleged charisma. So let’s say Kaplan socks him with $15 million and Engoron with, oh, $450 million. Hardly implausible. Both are supposed to happen within a matter of days. Then there’s the campaign trail. Trump is going to win the GOP nomination, sure, but Haley has stepped up her attacks—apparently realizing that now that it’s a two-person race, the only chance she stands is to finally go after her opponent, especially now that he’s calling her "Birdbrain" and mocking her fashion choices. "I know that’s what he does when
he is threatened, and he should feel threatened, without a doubt," she told a South Carolina crowd. Trump will dispatch Haley in the February 24 primary in that state—and then, possibly, he’ll turn right around and face Jack Smith’s prosecutors in a Washington courtroom the next week. The trial date is March 4, although that’s up in the air, pending the resolution of a pretrial motion. So Trump’s going to be winning primaries—that is, inside the hall of mirrors that is the Republican Party faithful—while out in the real world he’s going to be losing in court, and losing what’s left of his mind. Now that Trump’s mental condition is fair game, he’s just going to deteriorate even more—a self-reinforcing downward spiral into the quicksand of his cankered soul. The second change, even more important albeit less fun to talk about, has to do with the reality—and the perceptions—of the economy. I won’t throw a bunch of numbers at you, but: gas prices down, Dow setting a new record above 38,000, and a great (not good—great) GDP report this week. More important still were those recent numbers showing that consumer
confidence is up more over the last two months than during any two-month period since 1991. Think about that. Thirty-three years. In 1991, Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce were being potty-trained (though not together!), and Patrick Mahomes wasn’t born. All this is why Punchbowl News, a reliable reflector of conventional wisdom, led its Friday morning newsletter with "Dems get ready to run on the economy." Think they would have done that even a week ago? And by the way, what is Trump’s reaction to this? To say he wants the economy to crash. He wants Americans to lose jobs and health care and houses and small businesses. If that’s not fodder for a 30-second ad, or about a dozen of them, Democratic operatives are more asleep than usual. This is even more important than Trump’s personal meltdown because most people still vote on the economy. They form their views and reach their conclusions three to six months out from the election, which is the next few months. If these two new narratives—Trump is demented, and the economy is strong—settle into conventional wisdom, the way we talk about this election may be very different indeed by Memorial Day.
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Item two: Mitch McConnell reverts to the mean |
I knew something was giving me the shakes these recent weeks. I finally realized it was the sight of Mitch McConnell taking a principled stand, on Ukraine. So it has eased my mind somewhat to see that McConnell has once again assumed his normal role of doing or saying anything for the sake of political expediency and power. "The politics on this have changed," McConnell boldly told his Senate GOP caucus Wednesday, meaning that Donald Trump had told him not to make a border deal with Democrats because Trump wanted to use border chaos as an issue against Joe Biden. First, let’s note what this tells us about Trump, though it’s hardly shocking: Just as he wants the economy to tank, he wants people (including children) to die at the border, fentanyl to continue to be smuggled into this country, and so on. And McConnell said he’s good with all that, and Senate Republicans shouldn’t do anything to "undermine" Trump. Fortunately, and rather to my surprise, several GOP senators reacted by telling Moscow Mitch to go stuff it. North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis even said it would be "immoral" for legislators not to act on a long-sought deal (which, by the way, favors conservative priorities) to help Trump. So they’re actually standing up to Trump too, even more so than McConnell, who has now signaled he’s backing down. Take note of this development. If a majority of Republican senators actually defies Trump here, that may be a very encouraging sign of coming chaos.
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Item three: Satan’s agent on Earth is back in the news |
Wayne LaPierre will take the stand today in Attorney General of the State of New York v. NRA, a case brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James (hey, she’s good!) alleging that LaPierre and other NRA leaders swindled the organization out of millions of dollars that they spent on private jets and yachts and a $17 million golden parachute, among other forms of pelf. If you were to ask me who is the most malignant and destructive American of the last 50 years, I would of course say Donald Trump. (Before Trump entered politics, by the way, I would have said Newt Gingrich, who has done more to destroy American political processes and institutions than anyone except Trump.) But if you were to ask me to name the most evil person? LaPierre, hands down. If it wasn’t true before Sandy Hook—and it was—it’s steroidally true after. Little children getting their faces blown off, and he and his evil and corrupt organization are completely unmoved. We can only pray that massive fines and jail time await him. And hopefully that will be just the beginning. If right-wingers are right about eternal life, there’s not much question about where he’s going to be spending his.
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Last week’s quiz: It’s GeoBowl Time! A few fun questions on U.S. geography
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1. Which horizontal state border line is further north—the California-Oregon line, or the Illinois-Wisconsin line?
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Answer: Illinois-Wisconsin, but just barely: The California-Oregon border is the 42nd parallel, at
42 degrees, and the Illinois-Wisconsin line is at 42°30', although it’s not exactly a straight line, which you can read about here.
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2. Which of these four cities is the furthest east?
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A. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania B. Jacksonville, Florida C. Charlotte, North Carolina D. Savannah, Georgia
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Answer: A, Pittsburgh, perhaps surprisingly—the most inland of the four cities.
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3. Rank these four states in terms of their physical size (square miles): Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin.
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Answer: Michigan (eleventh), Wisconsin (twenty-third), Pennsylvania (thirty-third), Ohio (thirty-fourth). This surprised me. Michigan! I forgot about the Yoopers, I
guess.
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4. Match the approximate driving time, according to Google Maps, to the intercity route.
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Chicago to Minneapolis Denver to Boise Houston to Kansas City Richmond to Buffalo
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13 hours, 30 minutes Six hours Eight hours, 30 minutes 11 hours, 30 minutes
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Answer: Chicago to Minneapolis, six hours; Denver to Boise, 13 hours 30; Houston to K.C., 11 hours 30; Richmond to Buffalo, eight hours 30. Longest I’ve ever driven in one day? New Orleans to Bluefield, West Virginia. Around 10 hours. Not easy!
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5. OK, pay attention. Traveling from which state to which other state below requires passing through the lowest number of in-between states?
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A. Wyoming to Indiana B. Utah to Iowa C. Delaware to Georgia D. Texas to Montana
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Answer: B, Utah to Iowa—just two states: Colorado and Nebraska. Long haul, to be sure, but just two states. The others are all three states. I loved this question and have been playing this game with my daughter all week, expanding it at her suggestion to the whole globe. Thursday, she asked me Thailand to Kazakhstan. She knew! (Three: Myanmar/Burma, China, and Kyrgyzstan.)
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6. Everybody knows (or I hope everybody knows) the Four Corners—the only "quadripoint" of states in the United States, where Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Arizona meet. Beyond that, there are a number of "tripoints" where three states meet. How many?
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Answer: D, 60! Amazing, no? But seemingly true. I count four for Massachusetts alone. Apparently 24 of these are officially in water,
but, hey, they count.
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This week’s quiz: Hello, Margot? Oscar not calling! In recognition of this week’s shocking Oscar snubs of Margot Robbie and Greta Gerwig, here’s a quiz about, uh, surprising Oscar choices in the past.
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1. One of the worst Best Picture winners ever was Cecil B. DeMille’s The Greatest Show on Earth, in 1952. Which true screen classic did it beat out?
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A. On the Waterfront B. An American in Paris C. High Noon D. Roman Holiday
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2. The year 1976 brought another surprise Best Picture–winner selection—the winner is a good movie, for sure, but whether it was really that year’s best is a very fair question. Which picture defeated such classics as Taxi Driver, Network, and All the President’s Men?
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A. Carrie B. Rocky C. Annie Hall D. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
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3. Which of these legendary directors never won an Oscar?
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A. Alfred Hitchcock B. William Wyler C. Milos Forman D. Joel and Ethan Coen
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4. Which of these celebrated actresses never won an Oscar?
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A. Faye Dunaway B. Judy Garland C. Olivia de Havilland D. Julianne Moore
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5. Another, more recent Best Picture shocker came in 2006, when Crash defeated which universally acclaimed film that was also nominated and was the heavy favorite?
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A. Brokeback Mountain B. No Country for Old Men C. Pan’s Labyrinth D. Slumdog Millionaire
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6. Margot Robbie was also denied a nomination in 2017 for an arguably greater performance as which real-life figure?
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A. Martina Navratilova B. Harper Lee C. Janis Joplin D. Tonya Harding
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I liked Barbie a lot, but I thought this movie was much better. Answers next week. Feedback to fightingwords@tnr.com. —Michael Tomasky, editor
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