stevenkesslar

Yes. That explains why Trump was elected. ☹️ There is clearly an authoritarian trend in the world. The US is hardly immune from it. Some would argue the US is leading it. There was just a great interview of Fiona Hill in Politico where she talks about what is at stake in Ukraine. And the wave of anti-US sentiment all over the world. I suspect some of that has to do with the fact that we urged Ukraine to take on Putin. And by "take on Putin" I really mean fight back, instead of submit or try to walk a very thin tightrope of neutrality. And now many Americans are suddenly weak in the knees. And since I am talking among friends, I should note that W. going after Iraq, just because he could, helped to open Pandora's box. That said, Putin didn't really learn the lesson of Iraq. Or Afghanistan. People like to own their country. If Putin wants to understand the long term consequences of what he has done, he need only look to those two countries. Afghanistan beat both the USSR and the US in the long term. Putin doesn't stand a chance. The nice thing about @Moses is he reminds us what is at stake. And why sticking to our principles is important sometimes.

Poor Vlad. I'm not a psychologist. But maybe he butchers women because he can't get it up. Meanwhile, Xi Whiz is playing poor Vlad like the pathetic old sadist he is. One leads a growing economy that will compete with the US. The other invades and butchers because he can't get his economy to rise. Or anything else.

Thank you. I am glad you have figured out that Russia's occupation of Ukraine is bad. Can you now convince your butcher/sadist leader of that? In terms of a double standard - yes, you do have a double standard, as @Marc in Calif has noted. Why are you a hypocrite that supports a butcher/sadist? I despise both Netanyahu and Putin. They both killed peace. Netanyahu killed peace in Israel, and Putin killed peace in Ukraine. That said, as a butcher Netanyahu does not measure up to Putin. Putin has killed maybe 500,000 Ukrainian soldiers, and turned hundreds of thousands of his own people into fertilizer. Just because he is a butcher, and he can. So I can be against both butchers. And I am. Why aren't you? Why do you support a butcher and sadist who engages in mass slaughter, while going after Israel? The double standard is yours, @Moses. Go ahead and call out Israel all you want. But the way Putin butchers soldiers, women, and children is even worse. Putin has turned Russia into a gas station and butcher shop. Other than that, your economy sucks. Xi Whiz is playing your butcher leader to be his strong man and sadist. But don't be surprised down the line when Xi Whiz finds it convenient to abandon your butcher and sadist. Even Xi Whiz, let alone Putin, can't change the fact that the US came out of COVID the strongest economy in the world. Notice how the Dow just broke records, while your economy is a dumpster fire? And everyone smart who can is leaving Russia, since they don't want to be Russian fertilizer. You might want to think about your double standard. It is not working well for you, or Russia.

Silly @Moses. Like Murderous Vlad, you are not much into facts. Here's what the report you cited said, I assume those are confirmed deaths. Here's the thing. When Murderous Vlad drops big bombs on Ukrainians kids and they end up being gobs of rotting flesh, it is harder to identify them. Could that be why Ukrainians now hate Russians and want Murderous Vlad to burn in hell forever? In terms of 25,000 in Mariupol, here is where I got the number from: This Is the World If Ukraine Loses Great essay written by a Ukrainian. He is right. If Murderous Vlad is allowed to win, middle class America is fucked. We'll have a murderous authoritarian gaining in stature. And Ukrainians will be even more fucked. Murderous Vlad will just go on killing women and children. It is who he is. It is what he does. This is why Biden and McConnell and Schumer are staying late and working hard. Republicans do want Murderous Vlad to win. Democrats do not want Murderous Vlad to win. My quote of the month goes to Senator Michael Bennett:

I wish. My nephew and I exchange long and boring emails that would bore most people here to tears. This week they have been about China, small modular nuclear reactors, whether China is smarter because Xi Whiz can just push really expensive reactors through, or whether the US is smarter because we figured out small nuclear reactors are, once again, NOT too cheap to meter. It's more fun than posting here, because I am not told I am boring and verbose. My nephew is boring and verbose, too. And as pen pals we actually learn shit from each other. Oh, and we email lots and lots about stocks. Lots of charts and graphs. Check out SOXL. He's up something like quadruple since he bought it last Fall. I'm up about 50 % just this month. So we are figuring out how to make money on stocks. It's not as fun as sex tourism. But it's legal. I can't make money being verbose and boring here. Meanwhile, while I'm being verbose and boring, Murderous Vlad is doing his thing. Killing women and children. And killing women and children. And killing women and children. It is who Murderous Vlad is. It is what Murderous Vlad does. Don't you ever feel ashamed of all the killing of women and children, @Moses?

Silly boy. That's not a question. That's denial. Russia: Thirteen Murders, No Justice I have a question. Who murdered Igor Domnikov? Surely not Murderous Vlad, right? I have another question. Who murdered Sergey Novikov? Murderous Vlad wouldn't do it, would he? I have another question. Who murdered Iskandar Khatloni? Not Murderous Vlad. He's a sweetheart. I have another question. Who murdered Sergey Ivanov? I'm sure Murderous Vlad didn't do it. I have another question. Who murdered Adam Tepsurgayev? Murderous Vlad loves journalists as much as he loves killing children in Chechnya. I have another question. Who murdered Eduard Markevich? Not my honey Murderous Vlad! I have another question. Who murdered Natalya Skryl? Oh, come on. Murderous Vlad has killed way more innocent Ukrainian woman. Who cares, really? I have another question. Who murdered Valery Ivanov? Murderous Vlad wouldn't shoot a Russian in the head 8 times. He needs those bullets to kill Ukrainians. I have another question. Who murdered Aleksei Sidorov? Could be Murderous Vlad. Killing with an ice pick saves bullets for the heads of Ukrainian soldiers. I have another question. Who murdered Dmitry Shvets? Murderous Vlad? Nah! He's a dream come true. For butchers. I have another question. Who murdered Paul Klebnikov? Murderous Vlad wouldn't do it. It was probably Vlad's kleptocrat friends who didn't like being exposed. I have another question. Who murdered Magomedzagid Varisov? Murderous Vlad sure is a nightmare for journalists, isn't he? Last question. Who murdered Anna Politkovskaya? Murderous Vlad? Like I give a shit! Let's face facts. Murderous Vlad wiped out about 25,000 Ukrainians in Mariupol alone. Many of them women and children. The 50 bullets in the head or chest of the journalists that opposed Murderous Vlad in his early days ain't shit. And Murderous Vlad will do the same to lots more towns and cities in Ukraine, and lots more women and children if he needs to. It is who Murderous Vlad is. It is what Murderous Vlad does. Again, I despise Netayahu. But he is a saint compared to Murderous Vlad. The number of Palestinian children Netanyahu has killed in his reign of terror is like one week's work for the sadist and butcher who runs your country, @Moses.

There's some other relevant comparisons. The IDF is clearly in a position to say this. If you attack us, we will smear the streets with the blood of your dead. And they are doing it. Death here, death there, death everywhere. We all agree it's sad. Add lots of dead journalists, which is the point @Moses wants to make. He's correct. It's a fact. Israel is in a position to retaliate, defend, or whatever you want to call it. And they are doing it. Russia is clearly in a position to say this. We can attack you, Ukraine. And we will smear the streets with the blood of your dead. Dead soldiers, dead citizens, dead journalists. Death, death, death. Russia will bring you death. Putin will bring you death. You may hate us for eternity, and hope Putin burns in hell. But guess what? We could fucking care less. We can and will kill 500,000 of your soldiers. We don't care. Russia and Putin bring you death and misery. It's just that simple. Is there any question why Ukrainians hate Russians, and why Israel is pretty much united that Hamas sucks? That doesn't mean Putin and Hamas will just go away. Any successful plan has to start with the reality that Putin and Hamas can't simply be wiped out, unless we maybe want to blow up the whole planet. But they ARE the problem. Putin and Hamas have this in common. They like death. They want to kill. They are sadistic butchers. It is who they are. It is what they do. It is how they get and keep power. All you have to do is read where people are dying, including journalists. You are correct, @Moses. Gaza and Ukraine are bloodbaths. Why? Because sadistic butchers like Hamas and Putin made it that way. I despise Netanyahu and I think the IDF is going way too far. I think Putin calculated correctly that he could at the very least weaken Ukraine and create a stalemate. But none of that changes the fact that Hamas and Putin started the death. Certain facts are plain and simple. Hamas is a terrorist organization. Putin is a sadistic butcher. Do you agree, @Moses? If you want to understand why we have so many dead journalists, look to the butchers and sadists and terrorists who started it first. In my country, I could and did say George W. Bush sucks and this whole idea of attacking Iraq is insane. Granted, we did it anyway. I won't defend it, and I am not proud of it. Now most Americans and most of the world agree with me. My college mentor was a liberal Jewish professor who somehow ended up being a US Senator who was the only Democrat running for re-election in 2002 to oppose the Iraq War. There are conspiracy theorists who actually believe that got him killed in a small plane crash. I don't believe that. Here's my point. I can say my leader sucks and is wrong. Wellstone could vote against that war, and say it was a horrible mistake. In Russia, if you say these things, or oppose Putin, you are sent to the front. If you oppose the war, you become fertilizer or dog food in Ukraine. I'm not sure if you agree with Putin. Or if you just don't want to be sent to the front. Of course, I don't think Putin does that to journalists who disagree with him. He just jails them, or kills them. We settled that a long time ago. The murder that killed free media in Russia. Why aren't you ashamed of living in a failing country run by a sadistic butcher, @Moses? You should be. By the way, did you notice that Xi, not Putin, went to San Francisco and was given accolades by Apple? Have you noticed how China, not Russia, is having all-of-government meetings, starting with Biden and Xi, to figure out how to put out these fires, rather than starting them? Have you noticed that the Chinese economy came out of COVID a mess, and the US came out of COVID with the strongest economy in the world? What I am trying to say politely, @Moses, is that Xi is playing your sadistic butcher of a leader, just like your sadistic butcher of a leader played his sadistic butcher of a chef, who is now dead. Boo hoo! You get my point, right? None of this changes the fact that Russia is a failing economy that engineers who have the skills to work for Apple are fleeing in droves. Because they don't want to end up being a journalist in Russia. Or fertilizer in Ukraine.

I of course agree. Speaking of my nephews, the Sandersesque one asked me what I thought of the Republican House shit show. Before he even gave me a chance to answer, he kind of scripted my answer by suggesting I must be feeling Schadenfreude (Sorry, I don't speak Russian. Is German okay?) I surprised him by saying I was hoping the Republicans would take the House in 2022, for two reasons. First, like with Clinton in 1994 and Obama in 2010, I figured it would give Biden a foil to look more sane against when he ran for a second term. On that I have not been disappointed. The whacko wing of the GOP hit the ball into the Santosphere. Second, I figured it would give Biden a path to moderation and compromise. Like Clinton in 1994, for sure. (Remember, that's the last time we had a budget surplus?). That "meet in the middle" re-election concept didn't work so well with Obama in 2010. And we could debate whether it was because of Obama, or Boehner, or what Boehner called "the whackadoodles". (Spoiler alert: Team MTG is even more whackadoodle than what Boehner had to deal with. At least the Senate got immigration reform passed in 2014. It was the House Freedom Caucus that killed it.) It's interesting that Biden actually got Republicans to compromise when Democrats ran the House, and the moderate D's and R's (yes, there are a few) could actually meet in the middle on infrastructure, chips, and gun control. The idea that House Republicans will compromise with Democrats is obviously hopeless. Since House Republicans can't even compromise with Republicans. So it all suggests Biden won't have compromises to run on for 2013 and 2014. Although one can always hope, probably illogically, that immigration reform may pass. But if Biden doesn't have compromise, he will at least have the House shit show to point his finger at. So I'll just repeat that the hope is that there is no recession. And Biden will win as the lesser, albeit older, of evils. AB Stoddard, who does a good job of speaking in the voice of center/right, just wrote a scary piece arguing that voters are now used to all the horrors of Trump. So nothing he does or says really matters anymore. If she's right, and people want to hope for a return to a pre-inflation Trump economy, he may well be the 47th POTUS. I'm hoping she's wrong. And when people in the middle really focus on Trump, his crimes, and how he wants to repeal Obamacare again, it will also seem like just one more act in the Republican shit show. Mostly, I'm hoping inflation stays down, interest rates follow inflation down, and we have no recession. It's probably true that people just don't care much about whether Trump is criminal, or Biden is old. They probably care more about inflation and interest rates.

The Change Campaign That Can Contest America I thought that was an interesting set of polls from (Bill) Clintonista pollster Stan Greenberg. Greenberg is the spouse of Rep. Rosa DeLauro, who more than anyone else is Congress championed the expanded child tax credit that cut child poverty in half in 2021. Until the Republicans refused to reauthorize it. The whole 80 page report is worth reading. Which you can do by hitting the first download button under the PDF image. This report is consistent with the populist economic ideas that Greenberg has been polling and pushing for years. Here is a brief summary: That squares with lots of other polls, and my view of reality. I recall a poll taken right after the expanded monthly child tax credits went away, thanks to Joe Manchin and lack of Republican support. There was something like a 7 point shift toward Republicans from voters with kids who got, then lost, the expanded credit. Whether that's because they were pissed that Democrats let it lapse, or they were pissed about inflation, was unclear. But from talking with people who got the credit it probably would have offset most of the sting of global inflation in 2022, had the more generous monthly credits continued. Greenberg's current polls show similar bad news for Biden as every other poll. If the election were held today, Trump would probably win. What Greenberg is great at is defining an economic populist message that Biden and Democrats can fight for. Which, as Greenberg recommends, should start and end with the idea of raising taxes on the rich. As I've said in other posts, my bet is mostly that Allan Lichtman is right. Having an incumbent running, and avoiding a bitter fight between Harris and progressives and (name a Democratic Governor), probably means that Democrats are better with Biden on top of the ballot. Despite his weaknesses. Lichtman argues that the polls are useless. I mostly agree. But this polling gives Democrats a good populist message to fight for. I got a good reality check on this from two of my Millennial nephews over Thanksgiving. They both would prefer Biden step aside. Both are great examples of young voters who disapprove of Biden. That said, there is no question that while they disapprove of Biden they will never vote for Trump. One thinks Biden is too liberal, especially on his green energy stuff. The other thinks Biden is not progressive enough. Which again underscores that not having Biden could be a recipe for a big, and unhelpful, Democratic food fight. I summarized Lichtman's Keys theory to both. Especially the fact that he predicted every race since 1984 accurately, in advance. And that he thinks not having an incumbent and having an internal food fight would hurt Democrats - just like it did in 2016, as he predicted in Fall 2016. I loved my progressive nephew's reaction. "All that makes common sense. Democrats would be better running an incumbent. Just not this incumbent!" That said, if Biden is the nominee, he'll likely get the votes of many young voters who don't approve of him. If the alternative is Trump. Trump himself just helped matters by promising to resurrect his failed "repeal and replace" Obamacare plan. The ACA is quite popular among Millennials and Gen Z. It is viewed most favorably by voters aged 18-29, and least favorably (but still net favorable) by voters over 65. Going after Romney for his distaste for "the 47 %" worked for Obama in 2012. Despite an economy that was in worse shape than today. Biden should focus his fire on how Trump's Republicans cut taxes for the Top 10 %. And how they have opposed the things Democrats have done to help middle class and working class families.

I was gone for a week, so a slow response. I don't disagree with the merit of your argument at all. But that's not my point. In politics, perception is reality. Not to be elitist, but in the age of MAGA one might add that ignorance is bliss. Although ignorant populism is nothing new, on any partisan side. So I would not be shocked if Palestinian Americans in Michigan are the new Jill Steins and Ralph Naders, who help elect exactly what they don't really want: Trump. At least in the case of Palestinian Americans it won't be because they rally behind Trump. More likely it will be that they feel like Biden betrayed them, and they just won't vote. That is how many if not the majority of them feel now. But the election is a year away.

Joe Biden: The U.S. won’t back down from the challenge of Putin and Hamas I thought Biden's op/ed was an interesting compare and contrast to John Oliver. Two things we know for sure right off the bat. John is younger, and funnier, than Joe.😉 While Oliver did not use these exact words, I took him to mean this: the leaders of Gaza (Hamas) and Israel (Netanyahu and his far right wing allies) are both obstacles to peace. If that is one his main points, I agree. Half Biden's argument is about Ukraine, which I'll ignore. On Israel, I'll give him an A on Hamas and a D on Team Netanyahu. I'm fine with rhetoric about Hamas being pure evil. Oliver was unequivocal, too. Especially given the reaction of Jews in Israel and around the world - the shock is easy to understand - I don't think "Let's forget about The Holocaust" or "This was not The Holocaust' is a good message. So, fine. Hamas is pure evil. And every one of their leaders deserves to achieve their potential by being fish food at the bottom of an ocean. Right next to whatever is left of Bin Laden. Biden also says all the right things about how Palestinians and Gazans are not Hamas. And his heart - and humanitarian aid - goes out to them. This is where his argument really falls apart for me. If this were 2000, and Barak were Prime Minister of Israel, I would emphatically agree. So I can run two ways with this argument. First, Joe Biden is the wise and seasoned leader who can perhaps finally craft the peace deal that has eluded everyone else. Or, second, Joe Biden is a senile old fool who has no idea what decade he is in. And has no clue how the peace that he says is imperative will be achieved. Let alone by him. Or Bibi. Biden takes a few pot shots at extremist settlers in the West Bank. But what's missing is any awareness, let alone strategy, about the two most obvious impediments. Which John Oliver details nicely. First, Bibi is an honorary baby killer. Because he did everything he could to assist the growth of Hamas in order to kill a two state peace deal. Second, even if Israel shit cans baby killer Bibi, because they actually are pissed at how he was complicit with the pure evil baby killers, what comes after Bibi - like especially in a decade or two when the ultra-Orthodox Jews that back Bibi are an even bigger force - is likely going to be more anti-Arab. And more anti-Gay, probably. So the argument about Israel does nothing for me. Other than leaving me wondering whether Biden is out of touch with reality, or more likely just playing it like a hawk. Which reminds me of that vote of his for the Iraq war. Which he was for, but not really. This is the worst of Biden, not the best. It does not make me want to vote for him. Even though I will. I know the polls should be ignored, blah blah blah. But a new one out of Michigan is particularly depressing. Democrat Elissa Slotkin is two points up in her Senate race against either likely Republican opponent. Meanwhile, Biden is down 5 points against Trump and 11 points against Nikki Haley. Michigan is of course the swing state where Palestinian Americans could be the ones who decide whether Biden can win again. But the pattern is the same in every other swing state. Biden does far worse against Haley than Trump. By the way, @TotallyOz, you were right. I've been favoring Tim Scott as a newer and better Republican face. You've said nice things about Nikki. You seem to have called this one right. If Trump loses in 2024, she's a likely front runner in 2028. And she's potentially in striking distance in New Hampshire. I'm assuming Scott got out in part because if Haley wins or does well in New Hampshire, she could also potentially win in South Carolina. This is not helping Biden with Independents and young voters. A plurality of both groups - even Independents! - are now saying the US should reduce military aid to Israel. This next one really surprised me. Independents are more likely than Democrats to favor decreasing military aid to Israel. With Democrats, 25 % are for decreasing military aid, versus 21 % for increasing it. With Independents, 29 % are for decreasing military aid to Israel, versus only 14 % for increasing it. Bad news for Biden, and Bibi. My argument - that Israel has lost a pro-Israel US majority - is growing more true with each bomb that drops and each Palestinian baby that dies.

Great video. Like you said at the outset, the leaders on both sides = Hamas, and Netanyahu - are nuts. The Jewish and Palestinian Dads who lost their children to the bloodshed and are working together for peace are inspiring. They are not nuts. The only thing I didn't like about the video is that it only included half an hour of rapid continuous talking. I like my rants to be full and detailed, not very short and superficial like Oliver was. Do you happen to have the five hour version? 😉

Leader of Israel’s Labor: Something is ‘very wrong’ on the global left Kudos to Labor leader Merav Michaeli for three things she said. First, and probably most important, she said Bibi Netanyahu "has to go". And Israel should return to a two state solution, if they want peace. This is a nice companion to the blunt statements former PM and DM Barak has been making. I would not expect either, let alone any Israeli Jew running for dog catcher, to argue the IDF is committing "war crimes," as pundits on the right and left I quoted above are. What is most helpful and honest is they're making clear that anyone who thinks this problem has a solely or mostly military solution is simply asking for more war. Not peace. Michaeli also said this: That's 1000 % sad. 500 % of the sadness is the tragedy of the slaughter. The other 500 % is the tragedy that it almost guarantees a two state solution is dead for a long time. Or forever. Meaning, much more death of innocent Jews and Palestinians is the sequel. In that new interview of Mearsheimer I posted above, he and Napolitano speculated that Biden, unlike Obama or Clinton or Carter, has not wasted time on a two state solution for a good reason. Biden is a realist. And he knew, even before Oct. 7th, it was simply not gonna happen. Leading to the third important thing Michaeli said: I appreciate Michaeli being very specific in calling out the Left. Yes, calling for the mass murder of Jews is clearly going too far. And failing to identify Hamas as a vicious terrorist organization that is very bad news for both Jews and Gazans is not going far enough. I just wonder why Bibi Netanyahu spent years building up Hamas. Or at least being complicit in it. Does that make him complicit in the beheading of innocent Jewish children, too? The reason I appreciate leftist Israeli Jewish leaders calling out the global left is that my impression is most of what conservatives are saying about the left regarding Israel is total bullshit. At this point I expect Alan Dershowitz to be factually wrong about most things. Including his predictions about how American Jews will become Republicans. What I found amusing is that in an article where he goes off about what the headline labels "vile Leftist anti-Israel hate," the best picture they can come up with to illustrate this vile hate is the one above. Which actually confirms my impression that most - but not all - of the message from the left has been opposition to: 1) Israeli occupation, 2) Israeli apartheid, and/or 3) Israeli genocide. How is protesting these things anti-Semitic? How is not wanting more violence against innocent Jews in Israel, or anywhere, anti-Semitic? The closest Dershowitz can come to giving an example of "vile Leftist anti-Israeli hate" is what some speaker said at a DSA rally in New York. Wow! Except I'm actually more worried that a lot more people buy the total bullshit Dershowitz spews about Trump's lies. Meanwhile, back in reality, my impression is much of what the left is speaking out about is protecting the rights and lives of Palestinians. And many liberals, like our Veep and her hubby, are speaking out against growing anti-Semitism, too. As they should. So I'm very glad Israel's Labor Party is speaking out and setting parameters. Supporting Hamas, or jihad, or the mass slaughter of Jews, is way beyond garden variety anti-Semitism. But the truly saddest part of that Politico article is that it notes that Labor, which was once the voice and conscience of Israel, and of a two state solution, is now reduced to being at the margin. 4 seats in the Knesset. Which is why I fully expect three outcomes from what Bibi does: First, more dead innocent Jews. Second, more dead innocent Jews. Third, more dead innocent Jews. Like you, @EmmetK, Michaeli cites concerns about Hamas when it comes to democracy and LGBTQ rights. Ya think? These are good things to point out. Did I mention there have not been elections in either Gaza or the West Bank for almost 20 years? So it's quite fair for conservatives to throw stones at anti-democracy and homophobic Arab terrorists. That said, there is the whole thing about people living in glass houses. There is Bibi getting in bed with anti-Arab and anti-Gay right wing Jewish leaders. As well as his history of nurturing Hamas to defeat any hope of a political solution. And lately millions of Israeli Jews also view Bibi as a threat to democracy. Did I mention this will only get worse as the right wing parties grow? Arguably, the problem with Jewish Gays in Israel is they don't have as many kids as ultra-Orthodox Jews who would happily discriminate against Jewish Gays in Israel. There was a time I can easily recall when Israel had very good Labor leaders that article cites - Rabin, Peres, Barak. Decades ago I hoped they would raise the standard. Countries like Saudi Arabia aren't exactly beacons of democracy. Israel had leaders that did try to show what democracy and peace in a two political solution could do. So I don't think this is a time for anyone to be proud of how Bibi has instead systematically lowered the standards for peace, for democracy, and for the basic preservation of human life.

Well this is a funny coincidence. That manages to make Nate Silver look stupid, anyway. Yesterday Politico put up a "don't wet your pants" opinion piece by Jim Messina, who ran Obama's 2012 campaign. What jumped out at me is this: That's all true. Obama/Biden had an economy that stayed in a deep rut for a long time, which cost them dearly in 2010. One of the reasons 2022 may not have been as bad as feared for Democrats is precisely because we were not in a deep rut, like in 2010. And the Biden/Harris economy of 2023 looks like a sleek machine compared to the Obama/Biden economy of 2011. In Nov. 2011 the misery index was 12. In Nov. 2020 the misery index was 7.8. Today the misery index is 7.5 I can't think of any of this without going back to Lichtman's Keys. And the basic idea that American voters are smart, not stupid. And they vote based on Important Stuff, like the economy, stupid, rather than Dumb Shit, like polls. Messina obviously agrees. And Team Biden does plan to win a referendum on the economy in a year. But they are clearly not winning it yet. If Obama could put lipstick on a pig, even a senile Biden can perhaps put lipstick on an economy growing at 5 % this quarter. In the process of saying don't wet your pants, Messina went after Nate Silver yesterday: Again, if it is the economy, stupid, Biden should be in a position to do the same. I'm guessing Nate Silver did not read Messina. So it's just a coincidence that he wants to repeat history. Or maybe he did read Messina. And this is Nate's way of saying, "Fuck you, Jim." Or is it, "Fuck you, Joe" ? Nate Silver says it’s risky for Dems to nominate Biden Actually, if you read the whole article Silver wrote, his basic point is that it is risky for Democrats to either nominate Biden, or not nominate him. I guess that means the 2024 race between Biden and Trump is going to involve risk. Geez! Who knew? I'm happy for Nate. In that predicting elections involve risk probably will age better than saying Obama, or Biden, has a 17 % chance of winning. All of this is making me feel better. Especially the part about actually winning, a lot, on Tuesday. I put my diapers back in the drawer. For now. Hopefully neither I or Joe Biden will be needing them in the next year. 🙄

You're the one who won't answer the question, other to speak in Bibi butcher talk. And try to change the subject. You'd rather talk about democracy than butchering Palestinian children in huge numbers. Which will lead to the butchering of more Jewish and Palestinian kids, probably also in huge numbers. I agree with former PM and Defense Minister Barak. Do you? Or do you just want to keep ranting like Bibi? That war is peace, and killing lots of innocent children is all part of a plan to minimize the death of killing innocent children? Barak says if Israel stays on the path is on, it can't have peace. And it can't have democracy. It can be a Jewish nation, where over half the residents or so are disenfranchised and live in an apartheid state. In Orwell-speak Bibi-speak, that means Israel will have a vibrant democracy, and lots of security. It can be a secure and peaceful nation, as long as it dedicates itself to constant war and the constant slaughter of innocent women and children. In Orwell-speak Bibi-speak that means Israel is committed to peace, and to the security of innocent Palestinian children. Barak is honest, at least. He knows that, unlike 20 years ago, he is now in a minority, unfortunately. Thank Bibi and his right-wing settlers for that. I wish Israel had more warriors like Barak, who will fight for peace. Rather than engaging in Bibi butcher talk. Oops, sorry. I meant Bibi butcher peace talk. You won't answer the question. And you won't be honest about what is obviously happening. You can't be.

Thanks for the lesson in Netanyahu speak. Peace is war. War is peace. The way we make peace with Palestinians is to prevent a two state solution. The way we prevent war with Hamas is by empowering them, year after year, to kill Jews. The way we prevent civilian deaths is to kill as many civilians as possible. The IDF protects entire Palestinian families by blowing them up. War is peace. Peace is war. You're good at this. Is your name Bibi? If Hamas were to use the same tactics as the IDF, there would be no Israel left. Which you would call genocide. You left out one other central tenet of Netanyahu warmongering and mass slaughter speak. It is very important to understand that if you support Hamas killing Jewish women and children, you are a terrorist lover and Jew hater. If you do NOT support the IFD indiscriminately killing Palestinian women and children, you are a terrorist lover and Jew hater. The only way not to be a terrorist lover and Jew hater is to support the IDF indiscriminately killing Palestinian women and children. Wonder why this turns the world off? In fairness, it's not just Netanyahu speak, of course. There's an entire industry and lobby built around Orwell Netanyahu-speak. As it happens, just yesterday I watched this video that addresses IDF "war crimes". That's a phrase you should really have fun with, Bibi. Mearsheimer co-authored a whole book on how Israel gets away with it. Talk about verbose! Talk about Jew hater! Granted, Napolitano and Mearsheimer, and any conservative or liberal who does not support the IDF indiscriminately killing Palestinian women and children, are Jew haters. There is a perfect example Napolitano brings up. In order to take out one Hamas leader, the IDF just killed 200 innocent Palestinians. Obviously, that makes Napolitano - and anyone who would think this way - a terrorist lover and Jew hater. When Hamas kills 200 innocent Jews, it is genocide. When the IDF kills 200 innocent Palestinians, it is obviously the right thing to do. And if you don't believe that, you love terrorists. Regardless, Napolitano and Mearsheimer state what they view as clear facts: both Hamas and the IDF are committing war crimes, obviously and right before our eyes. Mearsheimer obviously hates Jews, and loves Hamas. I'll quote directly, from about 9:00 in the talk: This is obviously a genocidal lie. These guys are the war criminals! Let me translate that to Orwell-speak Bibi-speak, so you don't have to bother posting again, @EmmetK. Hamas is a terrorist group of war criminals. The IDF only seeks peace. The IDF only indiscriminately kills thousands tens of thousands (hundreds of thousands?) of Palestinian women and children to minimize their death.

Turns out on this forum, it is better to be a zombie than to be verbose. 🤔 Count your blessings @Kostik. At least people read what you post before they laugh at it. 😉

Nice article from Thomas Edsall. One of my favorite reporters and authors, for decades. Because he is .............. wait for it ................. verbose, very detail oriented, and almost always insightful and correct. ‘The Longer and Bloodier the War, the Harder it Will Be for the Democratic Coalition’ That's the part that jumped off the page. The bad news for Biden is this is dividing his party in a way that almost certainly won't be healed easily. The good news, as Ornstein says, is the election is a year away. And how people feel then will be shaped by the outcome. If this were to create a regional opening for peace, or even a two state solution, that would be much better for Biden. And Palestinians and Jews. But .......... the bad news for Biden is that with Bibi and Hamas in charge, peace is simply not on the agenda. The war is likely to be longer, and bloodier.

I agree with everything he said. Here are the main "but let's not get too optimistic" rejoinders that also make sense. 1. Trump was not on the ballot in any of the elections where abortion rights did so well. In the two elections he has been on the ballot, each time he pulled a surprisingly high level of turnout. In each of these abortion victories, including in Ohio, it is clear that some voters - especially women - who voted for Trump before voted for abortion rights now. So whether or how that translates into votes for other Democratic priorities or candidates when Trump is on the ballot in 2024 is not at all clear. 2. Judis and Teixeira think Democrats need to call a culture war truce, not Republicans. They both acknowledge that abortion in particular is a culture war positive for Democrats. But I think they are generally right that moderate voters, including Hispanic and Black and Asian ones, feel some of the "woke" stuff is a big turn off. If Democrats want to win Governor races in states like Kentucky, or Senate races in 2024 in states like Missouri or Indiana or West Virginia (or Montana, or Ohio) it is not even an option. 3. The poll numbers for Trump and Biden among young voters absolutely suck for Biden. Biden won in 2020 because Millennials and especially Gen Z carried him on their backs. One exit poll showed him carrying voters under 30 by 24 points in 2020. Now, the margin is surprisingly close. Like a single digit. So younger voters will clearly go out and vote for a pro-abortion state Supreme Court candidate, or Governor. But how that works out for Biden in 2024 is also completely unclear. The polls and even more so the focus groups suggest young voters who are leaning toward Trump are basically saying, "This turd smells slightly less bad than the other turd, maybe, and it least it can walk." Or something like that. 4. Unlike 2020, Biden is viewed far less favorably than a generic Democrat. So there is a distaste for Biden, specifically. With age being the most likely suspect. The most telling number in that "oh shit" NYT/Sienna poll is that a generic Democrat actually does BETTER against Trump in 2024 than in 2020. Four years ago NYT/Sienna showed Biden two points ahead of Trump. Now they show Trump five points ahead of Biden. On the other hand, four years ago the Times/Sienna poll showed a generic Democrat leading Trump by three points. In other words, Biden did about as well as an unnamed generic Democrat against Trump, and actually did better than any named Democrat like Warren. Four years later it shows a generic Democrat leading Trump by eight points. The good news is that "generic Democrat" actually does better in 2024 than 2020. The bad news is that today, unlike four year ago, Biden does far worse against Trump than a generic Democrat. That explains a lot of the difference between what polls are saying, and how people are voting on everything other than Joe Biden. I'm not saying Biden should drop out. The opposite. Either way, it's going to be a close race. And if I had to bet, I'd bet on Lichtman's Keys. Meaning, having Biden run as the incumbent is more likely to be a plus, not a minus. Partly I'd bet that way because, so far, his prediction system has always been right. But also because it just makes common sense to me. Running with an incumbent, and focusing on unifying the party rather than having an internal bloodbath, is probably going to help Democrats. That said, Lichtman's own theory is basically playing the odds. The model is simple enough: when you have these variables, history says it usually works out this way. In 2024, there is no question that Biden will be testing how much the power of incumbency is really a benefit. I don't think the polls are all wrong. Biden on the top of the ticket is at best a mixed blessing. My hope, which is reasonable, is that if we are not in a recession next Fall, and the economy and stock market keep growing between now and then, that will likely be enough to carry Biden and Democrats to victory. It's certainly not bad news for Democrats that even though people are still pissed about inflation, and about half of Americans feel like we are in a recession, they don't seem to be taking it out on Democrats every chance they get. Lichtman himself is saying the verdict is out. In addition to his two economy keys, he also points to his two "war and peace" keys. When he did that brief interview above several months ago, I assumed that Ukraine was going to be neither a success nor a failure a year from now. But now that there is a second war in play, the chances of a foreign policy success or failure altering the outcome of the POTUS race seems higher.

I was going to post in the thread about Why Biden Might Lose. But my prediction potpourri (or verbal diarrhea) fits bit better here. Since everything I'll say involves one form of prognostication or another. And this post is mostly about Why Biden Might Win. It was a good night for Biden 2024, I think. Several pundits have noted that the Kentucky Governors race has been a perfect bellwether in this century. Whoever is elected Kentucky Guv the year before the POTUS race, their party wins the White House next year. Of course, that could mostly be about having the name Beshear on the ballot. But the total impact of all the races tonight, including abortion in Ohio and the legislative races in Virginia, is that the Democratic brand is doing pretty well. Reeves won in Mississippi again, but by no more than he did in 2019. A Democratic win in Mississippi would have been a real shock. Meanwhile, Beshear barely won in 2019, but seems to be winning by like 5 % tonight. John Judis and Ruy Teixeira are just out with their update on The Emerging Democratic Majority. They scold the woke progressive types for going way too far in the culture war, thus alienating too many moderate working class voters. Their Plan A for winning more, especially in red states so Democrats can have a Senate majority, is to call a culture war truce. At least in most of the places, some of the time. Andy Beshear just proved how well that works. I agree that horse race polls a year out mean nothing. In 1983 Mondale was set to beat Reagan by double digits, one poll said. The polls that most political hacks say do tend to be sticky are the approval ratings. And on that score, time is running out for Biden. How unpopular is Joe Biden? Obama, Clinton, and Reagan all had lower approval ratings at some point in their first terms than Biden has right now. But by this point, a year out, all three of them were starting to recover. As you can see from those comparison charts. The only three that were down this low one year out - Trump, Carter, Ford - all lost. I was hoping by now Biden would be recovering, too: more GDP growth, less inflation, people are now actually making more in wage hikes than inflation in 2023. But that's not how people are feeling, yet. The helpful way Team Biden talks about "Bidenomics" is that they're focused on where the puck will be in Nov. 2024, not Nov. 2023. The only problem is it takes time to get from one place to another in politics. The point of all those approval polls is that it took a year for Reagan, Obama, and Clinton to slowly change public opinion. Right now, Biden is going in the wrong direction still. Of course, some people might say the other problem is Joe Biden can barely walk, let alone skate fast. 😵 That is how a lot of young people feel. That doesn't help, either. Biden Lacks the Best Weapon Other Incumbents Have Had As another form of prognostication, I'll throw that piece from Jeff Greenfield in. He makes an interesting argument, which I think is wrong. He thinks the idea that a Presidential race is a referendum on the incumbent is often "wildly off the mark." I agree with Alan Lichtman that Presidential races are exactly that: an up or down referendum on the incumbent party. Greenfield continues his argument that Biden doesn't have what Obama had: the ability to turn his still somewhat unknown opponent into a jerk. Because everybody knows Trump is a jerk (specifically, an indicted jerk) already. And yet he's still slightly ahead in the polls. But I actually think that is one of Biden's real assets. Trump is well defined. And people do think he is a jerk. The only good thing about 55 % of Americans disapproving of Biden is that 55 % also disapprove of Trump. And that number probably ain't gonna get better. Then there is the bed wetting from David Axelrod and Jim Carville, who I don't normally think of as bed wetting types. Although Axelrod actually denied in his tweet that he was wetting the bed. Regardless, I doubt he'll be invited to sleep at The White House ever again. I decided a while back I'm going to go all in for Alan Lichtman. He has a system that makes sense. It suggests Americans vote based on Important Stuff, like the economy, stupid, rather than on dumb commercials or polls. More important, Lichtman's predictions have been right, every time, since 1984. (He predicted Gore would win in 2000, which he did if you count popular votes. After that he just focused on who would win, period. He called 2016 for Trump.) The nice thing about looking at it Alan's way, right or wrong, is that Biden is not only the best choice. He is the only choice. Right now Biden is for sure down three keys: lost the 2022 midterms, has no foreign policy win and is unlikely to get one, is not charismatic. You have to be down six to lose, history says. Lichtman would argue that most of what Greenfield says is pundit babble. The only thing Lichtman says matters about the challenger is that he is not unifying and charismatic. Trump is not unifying and charismatic. So he isn't going to help Joe Biden lose a referendum on Joe Biden. To be fair, Lichtman would argue Biden didn't really help Trump lose the referendum on Trump in 2020. Trump managed to do that all by himself, Lichtman says. Mostly because of the economy, stupid. So the way it's shaping up so far is almost exactly the same as 2016. The election is Biden's to lose. And the economy is the path to winning or losing it. It is not good news that, like in 1992, most people feel like we are in a recession. (Spoiler alert: we're not.) So if Biden loses the two economy keys, he's going to be hanging over the edge of the cliff. But what the economy keys basically say is that incumbents do well when there is no recession, and the economy is growing more quickly than it did under the last two Presidential terms. So 5 % GDP growth is the thing that will get the puck exactly where Team Biden wants it to be. Whether Joe Biden is a fast skater or not. Lichtman argues, with much common sense, that people care more about the economy than about how fast Joe Biden walks. The argument for Biden being the "only" candidate that makes sense is that being an incumbent is always a positive. And when you don't have an incumbent, but you have a divisive internal party fight, it usually ends badly. 2016 is a great example of that. Biden gives Democrats an incumbent, and it avoids a party fight. Lichtman says that he and his pattern recognition buddy, who was a global expert at earthquake prediction, developed variations of their system with fewer than 13 variables. But it took 13 to be right 100 % of the time, at least so far, he says. Of the 13, the single best predicter is whether a party has a knock down drag out internal fight. It usually predicts they will lose. Which is certainly true in my lifetime: Johnson in 1968, Ford in 1976, Carter in 1980, Clinton in 2016, and arguably some others. Again, all of this makes common sense if you start with the idea that American voters care about serious things, and have reasonably good judgment. What now seems almost certain is that a fourth key is going to turn against Biden: a third party candidate who gets over 5 % of the vote next November. Again, it makes lots of common sense to me to argue that in a year where George Wallace or John Anderson or Ross Perot do well running as a third party, it is a sign of serious discontent with the ways things are. And a political earthquake may be on the way. So do the math. I can name almost any sitting Democratic Governor and tell you they excite me more than Biden does. But if you assume that Lichtman predicted the last 12 Presidential elections correctly in advance because of something other than dumb luck, his theory tells us that Whitmer or Newsom or Shapiro or whoever are going to lose. Including a significant third party run, Democratic have four strikes against them. Not being an incumbent and being the survivor of a bitter party brawl would be the necessary and sufficient fifth and sixth nails in their coffin. It's not personal. It's just what history says is likely to happen. Of course, probably if Biden dropped out, we wouldn't even need a primary. Everyone would immediately agree that obviously Kamala Harris should be POTUS. 🙄 Or Hillary Clinton. 😵 Or Bernie Sanders. ☹️ Or Gavin Newsom. 🤔 LOL. You get my point. If Biden had dropped out a year ago, I'd bet that the 2024 Democratic primary would have been a bloodbath. We're getting a taste of that with the bloodbath in Gaza, and the divided Democratic reaction to it. All of this makes sense to me in theory. What was sweet about tonight is that it seemed to actually work out that way, in fact. Whatever bad things there are to say about Biden and Harris, it did not drag Democrats, or Democratic issues, down in Kentucky, or Virginia, or Ohio.

Well, at least some Israeli Jews still think this way. Blessed are the peacemakers. Former Israeli Prime Minister: Israel’s Endgame in Gaza Should be a Palestinian State I vastly prefer Barak's concept of "security" to the one being throw around by the conservatives who want to turn Gaza, and countless innocent Gazans, into a parking lot. The interesting thing is that as one of Israel's most decorated warriors and long serving Defense Ministers, Barak would probably make a way more effective warmonger than Bibi, the great Hamas builder. Instead, perhaps because he is such a good warrior, Barak has always been a sober realist. He's right that Israel won't have security, or even democracy, in the long run if it stays on the path that it is on. It's also noteworthy that Barak says about as bluntly as any Israeli leader has that Bibi intentionally elevated Hamas. So he could have a bad guy to play off Fatah in orderto discredit the idea of negotiation and a two state solution. So for @EmmetK and others who want to make it about only one thing - how Hamas cuts open the bellies of pregnant women and burns their babies alive - I have a question. What is the price Bibi should pay for being the father and framer of these evil men who slit open the bellies of pregnant women? Why did Bibi empower them and facilitate their growth? Is there some special part of hell he gets to burn in for misleading Israel for a generation? Or is it okay that he is the spiritual and political father of the baby killers? Barak is sober that Israeli Jews, right after Oct. 7th, are hardly going to rush toward peace. But he is also right that Israel absolutely needs partners in the region and the world. He just said in a Politico article that maybe the IDF has a few weeks before the pressure from Europeans and Americans forces Israel to change course. I hope he is right. Israel has only weeks to defeat Hamas as global opinion sours, former PM Ehud Barak says There's something else Barak said in that interview that I'll quote. It's a very important principle that I think most of the world. including most people like me who want a ceasefire, also agree with: Arguably, Israel has already been tough enough. But the reason I think that is so well stated is that the goal of making sure it never happens again is way more realistic, and probably way more effective, than the idea that Israel will somehow "eradicate Hamas." Eradication, regardless of how many innocent people to have die, is simply vengeful. More important, it is simply an impossible right wing fantasy. The entire history of this conflict is that Israel won security first and foremost through politics, diplomacy, negotiation, and creating as stable an order around itself as it could. And then they fought wars, too. Barak, who was Defense Minister for many years, seems to understand the bigger moral, political, and diplomatic picture of what really being able to say "never again" means. It is not only, or even primarily, a military problem. If there actually were a realistic plan to "eradicate" Hamas, Barak would be one of the most capable people to design it. He talks in that interview about how he has thought about it before. He also talks about how such a military operation in Gaza would take "many months, or a few years." Way longer than Israelis expect, he thinks. And that how long it might take would be impossible to guess before they got deeply into it. So many tunnels, so much time. The casualties would be tremendous, he says. But the other thing Barak says that will stop the IDF is he knows as well as anyone that [name an Arab country, or another Palestinian leader] could say, "Sorry, Israel. You broke Gaza, so you bought it." Which Mubarak did basically tell Barak before, when he tried to get Egypt to take over the mess. One of the cruelest things about this situation to me is that Israel is obviously the warden of this hellish open air prison. Even though it wants to pretend it isn't. So if Israel wants Arab countries, or Abbas, to help scoop up the rotting flesh of innocent women and children once the bombing stops, they are going to have to negotiate and compromise. Barak knows all this. And Bibi probably does, too. Which is why Bibi needed to be the spiritual and political father of the guys who slit pregnant women open and burn their babies alive. What a guy! Americans have seen this movie before, of course. And we know that it often ends tragically. We were the ones with the bright idea of arming and elevating the Taliban, when it served our interests. To our credit, at least we knew they didn't live five feet away from us. What's Bibi's excuse?

Hamas has said about 50 hostages so far have been killed by Israeli air strikes in Gaza. Whatever the actual number is, or ends up being, this was clearly intentional. You try to wipe us out, and you will kill innocent Jewish hostages instead. It's just as clear that Hamas uses innocent Palestinians as human shields. In fact, all of Gaza is both a massive open air prison, and a massive human shield. But so what? That's been the nature of the situation for about 15 years. There's all kinds of evidence that Netanyahu mostly saw it as a positive. Because it discredited the idea that we can ever have peace with Palestinians. Polls now say only 32 % of Israeli Jews favor a two state solution. And that was right BEFORE Oct. 7th. Which is an exact reversal from pre-Netanyahu days, when a majority of Israeli Jews favored a two state solution. In a sick, dark sort of way you could argue Bibi the monster won the debate. I emphatically agree with the brutality part. I strongly disagree with the stupidity part. I'll add a third important word: hypocrisy. I argued above that you can view Israel as a winner. They have secured land, and settled more of it. You can argue Palestinians are the losers, in that they live more and more in an apartheid state with no hope of a nation of their own. But, by the same logic, Hamas has won, too. As an objective fact, compare Hamas to 20 or 30 years ago and they are much stronger. They nominally run a nation. Even though of course Israel can and did cut off electricity and water and invade as they wish. Hamas clearly had a plan on Oct. 7th. It clearly seems to be working. I don't think Hamas played right into Bibi's ambition. I think Bibi took their bait. He's the one the polls say is now discredited, even among many of his own followers. Hamas organized Oct. 7th in a way that Bibi of course had no choice but to retaliate. Their taking of hostages, and putting them in tunnels and other hideouts, precisely anticipated the IDF response. That was the whole idea. You can call it evil. You can call it brutal. But I don't think you can call it stupid. There is this idea that I keep reading that somehow, someway, the IDF will "eradicate" Hamas. Being a verbose guy, I read lots of verbose essays by right of center IDF guys or conservative Jewish commentators. And no one has a clue how to eradicate Hamas. I'd argue "eradicate Hamas" is about as helpful as "from the river to the sea" as a Palestinian bumper sticker. If it makes you feel good, great. But as a political or military strategy, it makes 0 % sense. And on a practical level the bumper stickers basically are just inflaming and polarizing people on both sides who are already very hurt and very pissed. So you might say it is kind of stupid to say our plan is to eradicate Hamas when no one knows how to actually do it. And the history for 20 or 30 years says that Hamas prospers and grows in an environment of war. You could call Hamas "War Incorporated." Or I'd be okay with calling Hamas "Genocide Incorporated". They'd love the label. In that they intentionally deny Israel's right to exist, and use it to motivate pissed off Palestinian youth. It seems 1000 % clear that is an intentional strategy. And it is working. If you want more Hamas, you absolutely want to have more war. The more blood, the better. Hamas knows that. They're brutal. But not stupid. The hypocrisy part is that even if Netanyahu is gone in a month or a year, the growing force behind him - ultra-Orthodox Jews - will find someone else who is probably worse. As a part of a diverse democratic nation, they are the voters that are most helping to polarize the situation and block any hope of peace. And they are the ones that least want to fight the resulting war, which is a mandatory requirement. In several decades ultra-Orthodox Jews, now 13 %, will be 30 % or so of the voting population. It's a good guess they will press for things that lead to more war. And more political pressure to exempt ultra-Orthodox Jewish men from war. Which will further destabilize Israeli democracy. The two parts of Israel growing the fastest are Palestinians, and ultra-Orthodox Jews. Hamas seems to understand this very well. The plan to eradicate Hamas does not include a plan to actually eradicate Hamas. Meanwhile, Hamas sees how to spend decades building a path to power paved in blood and rotting flesh. Which is what they have done, successfully, for decades. That's brutal. But not stupid. I'll revisit the comparison I made between America's 9/11 and Israel's 9/11. Because I do think America mostly won. And I fear Israel will mostly lose. America won in the sense that there has not been another 9/11. And any political force like the Taliban knows that if you fuck with us like that again, you either end up living in a cave or being fish food at the bottom of an ocean. Even if you assume we Americans wrecked many lives and some real estate in Afghanistan, we were not fighting a war in the US, or Manhattan. Even if you assume the US did horrible shit, it was horrible shit we did far away that we could walk away from. Bin Laden's specific goal was to use a reaction against the US to catalyze revolution in the Arab world. What he won was a bullet in the head, and an opportunity to feed fish. Arguably, the US should have walked away from Afghanistan much earlier and said we'll leave your mess to you. And you can abuse women and treat them like slaves as much as you want. But just leave us the fuck alone, or we will come back and kill you. We have never had anything like another 9/11 since 9/11. Thanks in large part to the effective counterterrorism efforts of the US military and our global allies. I think the Netanyahu Doctrine was built on similar principles and ideas. Except it is not working. And it can't work, for lots of reasons. But the biggest one I will state is that it would be as if we did plan to fight the war on US soil, and blow the shit out of Manhattan. Or at least Brooklyn. And the cowboys in Texas would be saying, "We need to turn Brooklyn into a parking lot, and go house to house and tunnel to tunnel and wipe those evil fuckers out. But we don't want to help do it." That's just not going to work. No one in the IDF, and no right wing Jew who wants Israel to be secure, can explain how they will do it. Because they can't. Hamas understands all this. And has weaponized it in an incredibly brutal way. That is not stupid. If I wanted to argue the US lost in Afghanistan, I would argue it the same way. We lost in the sense that the Taliban could, and did, outwait us for a few decades. And they used US soldiers, who they killed as often as possible, as the bad guys to organize and regroup. Hamas will do the same. The black and white difference is the US was not in it mostly to make Afghanistan a democracy and a nice place for girls. The US was in it mostly to secure the US homeland. And a peaceful international order free of extremist whack jobs blowing up skyscrapers or wiping out large numbers of innocent civilians all over the world. Which is why we had so many good allies. On balance, I think the US did that. Israel is in a very different situation. The only thing that will ultimately secure a peaceful national order there is a two state solution. The world believes that. Israelis Jews used to believe that. Now they don't. So, instead, they will have war. Basically on their own soil, or five feet away.

You are correct. I know this is a tangent. But you and I both care about facts. I got what I said from what Hodge herself said in the interview I hyperlinked. But I checked Wikipedia and you are correct. This personal stuff is relevant to the big picture politics, I think. I have two impulses in me that are slightly at war. First, we have to have Israel's back. Second, it's not okay for Israel to do whatever it takes. And it definitely goes in that order. I suspect if I were younger, in my 20's, I might feel the same way, but the other way around. John Della Volpe just wrote a piece in the NYT that should scare the living shit out of everyone who does not want Trump, The Sequel. When it comes to polling on the youth vote, he is the go to go guy. Period. He predicted that Biden would ride a youth wave in 2020. Biden did. Now the headline says it all: "Biden is in trouble." Part of his point is that how young people feel about a ceasefire, and how Biden is rejecting an idea a majority of even Republicans seem to support, has just made a bad situation worse for Biden. Della Volpe is Mr. Polling. So I think he is factually correct when he argues this: Back to Hodge, in that interview she reflects on being a young woman spending months on a kibbutz where they toiled the soil all day and then talked about Rosseau and Marx in the evenings. I'm not a Jew, and I have never been to Israel. But that is the Israel I have in my heart. Which I suspect Joe Biden does, too. She jokes in that article that every attempt to turn her into a proper practicing Jew failed, until Corbyn came along. She also says she grew up surrounded by Jewish refugees. Her point is that while she may not have been a practicing Jew, she is very much culturally a Jew. Charlotte Nichols sounds like the opposite. A cultural Catholic who grew up Catholic, like me, but has a deep respect for Judaism. On a personal note, part of my bias is that as an organizer/activist my life has been full of liberal Jewish political activists. The one who for sure played the most important role was my friend, college professor, and former US Senator Paul Wellstone. He steered me into the career I had in my 20's and 30's and got me my first internship. He was a lot like what Hodge sounds like. Always looking out for the disempowered. Always passionate about social justice. He also thought Israel treated the Palestinians like shit. And that was in the 80's and 90's, before the rise of horrible leaders like Netanyahu, who Bill Clinton argues killed peace. I'll keep insisting that back in the 80's and 90's, Arafat was the primary suspect who killed peace. Kudos to Hodge and Nichols for being voices of conscience.

I just used it, repeatedly. And I have admitted to smoking, but not inhaling. I agree. The more inflamed the situation gets, the less useful the word "genocide" seems to be in this context. John Mearsheimer called the Nazis "Murder Incorporated." But "Genocide Incorporated" would have been an equally good label. I don't think Hamas killing 1500 Jews in a savage terrorist attack or the IDF killing, so far, 9000 Palestinians in their invasion is "genocide." I get that Hamas promotes a hateful ideology that denies Israel's right to exist. I get that many, maybe most Palestinians, feel Israeli Jews want to deny their right to exist as a nation, and force them to instead live in an apartheid state. All of this is awful. To me, "genocide" is not the right word. The reason I'm been using it is that if hawks want to throw around the word "genocide" to rationalize "whatever it takes" I think the consistent actions of leaders like Netanyahu, which have resulted in far more deaths of innocents, deserve the same label. It's a mess. Even on a personal psychological level, I think it's just a big fucking mess. My sense on a level of empathy is that this terrorism has triggered the worst fears of the even the kindest, most peace loving Jews. So on an emotional level I think I get where at least some of the primal fear about "genocide" is coming from. Which is why I am glad Biden went to Israel and hugged Bibi, symbolically. Even though I think Bibi is .......... wait for it ............ a genocidal monster. 🙄 It's barely related. But just because I admire her I will throw in this great interview I just read of Dame Margaret Hodge, who is the only female Jewish Labour MP in the UK. If we are talking about language, I think she is a class act who has a very nice and humane way of talking and thinking about things. She was like a moral compass when all the drama with Jeremy Corbyn, who she despises, was happening. Now she is talking about the stuff happening with her Jewish grand daughters in school. I wish more people thought and felt like her.