"Swift criminal justice for as many lawbreakers within the Miller regime as we can find (up to and including Miller)."
It's a sad irony that your great grandmother escaped Nazis and Miller's great great grandfather left pogroms in the Pale of Settlement. You grew up to be an honorable man, and Miller grew up to be a putz.
I'm glad you're wife wants to stay and fight. Me too.
I enjoy your work and look forward to reading it. But I also am convinced that to dislodge this fascistic regime (all 3 branches and red states) will require a cataclysm of epic proportions (a real pandemic, an economic catastrophe) that will create the space for a charismatic left populist to seize the public imagination.
2026 elex will be at best a holding action with a Dem House maybe able to cut spending on the police state and holding some high profile hearings/lynchings.
Yes, it sucks that some Democrats were cowards and didn't confirm Mangi in 2024. But there is also a second vacancy on the Third Circuit (created by the retirement of George W. Bush appointee Kent Jordan in Jan 2025), so even if Mangi had been confirmed, Trump still could have nominated Bove to that other seat.
I watched Slotkin venture out and give an interview to Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti at Breaking Points. Boy it was rough for Slotkin and it is a perfect demonstration of why Dems can’t engage in podcast world/new media: https://youtu.be/AFrEJTFbSTc?si=XykXMkIiY7lC0kKJ
I can’t get over Slotkin thinking she’s going to venture out to court the youngs on the internet and choosing a left-right show thinking it’s centrist and getting grilled on Israel from both the left and right on BreakingPoints. IMO the Dem nominee for 2028 should be able to take the heat and navigate all spaces and I don’t think Slotkin is presidential material.
I don't agree with the premise of "only to be swept out of power by a public that thinks there was overreach".
In 2016, I believed that the Senate Republicans would pay an electoral price for their stonewalling of the Merrick Garland nomination. I was wrong. I have since come to see the error of my ways, and realized that most voters (or at least swing voters) don't care about this kind of inside baseball the way we (anyone reading this) do. That is, the theft of the SCOTUS seat in 2016 outraged a lot of Democrats who were already going to vote Democratic, and future Democrats adding four seats to SCOTUS in 2029 will outrage a lot of Republicans who were already going to vote Republican, but that won't make a difference to the electoral outcome.
In response to Michael's "it does the Democrats no good at all to get a brief fleeting trifecta, add 4 justices to the court, only to be swept out of power by a public that thinks there was overreach."
The Trump/MAGA gang has shown that there are no consequences for breaking the law when you have enough power. If Democrats ever get back into power (a big 'if'), they have to stay in power, regardless whether or not some of the public think they have overreached. Has the Trump/MAGA crime gang overreached? You bet they have. But who's going to stop them? So far, no one. That's what Dems. in power need to ask themselves when they are 'overreaching' to protect what's left of our democracy. 'Who's going to stop us?' The only way out of this political doom loop is bold action - something the current Dem. leadership look incapable of.
Thank you to everyone for your wonderful questions and Brian for your answers. I think your response to Charles Hoods question could be a separate essay in itself, so many points from previous essays outlined together in your answer, how we reshape our future. I am glad you Great Great Grandparents were able to get out. My immediate family left between 1891 and 1914. Those family members who remained from both my mom (Hungary) and dad's (Austrian Galicia) side who I have been able to locate thru Yad Vashem and the Shoah Foundation were not that fortunate during WWII
1. Saying Mangi’s nomination stalled after some Republicans complained about his religion tells only part of the story. Cortez-Masto, Manchin, and Rosen, all Democrats, opposed Mangi’s appointment. Bove’s appointment is as much a product of their cowardice as that of the Republicans.
2. Slotkin has a reputation of overcoming the Democrats’ reputation for being weak-kneed and wishy washy. There is rarely, if ever, an explanation for why Harris received more Michigan votes than Slotkin.
Sorry for the length of this but couldn't find a way to link to the original post, about, as I have believed, the election was stolen. Wondering if you could verify?:
"The missing votes uncovered in Smart Elections’ legal case in Rockland County, New York, are just the tip of the iceberg—an iceberg that extends across the swing states and into Texas.
On Monday, an investigator’s story finally hit the news cycle: Pro V&V, one of only two federally accredited testing labs, approved sweeping last-minute updates to ES&S voting machines in the months leading up to the 2024 election—without independent testing, public disclosure, or full certification review.
These changes were labeled “de minimis”—a term meant for trivial tweaks. But they touched ballot scanners, altered reporting software, and modified audit files—yet were all rubber-stamped with no oversight.
That revelation is a shock to the public.
But for those who’ve been digging into the bizarre election data since November, this isn’t the headline—it’s the final piece to the puzzle. While Pro V&V was quietly updating equipment in plain sight, a parallel operation was unfolding behind the curtain—between tech giants and Donald Trump.
And it started with a long forgotten sale.
A Power Cord Becomes a Backdoor
In March 2021, Leonard Leo—the judicial kingmaker behind the modern conservative legal machine—sold a quiet Chicago company by the name of Tripp Lite for $1.65 billion. The buyer: Eaton Corporation, a global power infrastructure conglomerate that just happened to have a partnership with Peter Thiel’s Palantir.
To most, Tripp Lite was just a hardware brand—battery backups, surge protectors, power strips. But in America’s elections, Tripp Lite devices were something else entirely.
They are physically connected to ES&S central tabulators and Electionware servers, and Dominion tabulators and central servers across the country. And they aren’t dumb devices. They are smart UPS units—programmable, updatable, and capable of communicating directly with the election system via USB, serial port, or Ethernet.
ES&S systems, including central tabulators and Electionware servers, rely on Tripp Lite UPS devices. ES&S’s Electionware suite runs on Windows OS, which automatically trusts connected UPS hardware.
If Eaton pushed an update to those UPS units, it could have gained root-level access to the host tabulation environment—without ever modifying certified election software.
In Dominion’s Democracy Suite 5.17, the drivers for these UPS units are listed as “optional”—meaning they can be updated remotely without triggering certification requirements or oversight. Optional means unregulated. Unregulated means invisible. And invisible means perfect for infiltration.
...
Enter the ballot scrubbing platform BallotProof. Co-created by Ethan Shaotran, a longtime employee of Elon Musk and current DOGE employee, BallotProof was pitched as a transparency solution—an app to “verify” scanned ballot images and support election integrity.
With Palantir's AI controlling the backend, and BallotProof cleaning the front, only one thing was missing: the signal to go live.
September 2024: Eaton and Musk Make It Official
Then came the final public breadcrumb:
In September 2024, Eaton formally partnered with Elon Musk.
The stated purpose? A vague, forward-looking collaboration focused on “grid resilience” and “next-generation communications.”
But buried in the partnership documents was this line:
“Exploring integration with Starlink's emerging low-orbit DTC infrastructure for secure operational continuity.”
The Activation: Starlink Goes Direct-to-Cell
That signal came on October 30, 2024—just days before the election, Musk activated 265 brand new low Earth orbit (LEO) V2 Mini satellites, each equipped with Direct-to-Cell (DTC) technology capable of processing, routing, and manipulating real-time data, including voting data, through his satellite network.
DTC doesn’t require routers, towers, or a traditional SIM. It connects directly from satellite to any compatible device—including embedded modems in “air-gapped” voting systems, smart UPS units, or unsecured auxiliary hardware.
From that moment on:
- Commands could be sent from orbit
- Patch delivery became invisible to domestic monitors
- Compromised devices could be triggered remotely
This groundbreaking project that should have taken two-plus years to build, was completed in just under ten months.
Elon Musk boasts endlessly about everything he’s launching, building, buying—or even just thinking about—whether it’s real or not. But he pulls off one of the largest and fastest technological feats in modern day history… and says nothing? One might think that was kind of… “weird.”
According to New York Times reporting, on October 5—just before Starlink’s DTC activation—Musk texted a confidant:
“I’m feeling more optimistic after tonight. Tomorrow we unleash the anomaly in the matrix.”
Then, an hour later:
“This isn’t something on the chessboard, so they’ll be quite surprised. ‘Lasers’ from space.”
It read like a riddle. In hindsight, it was a blueprint.
...
The Outcome
Data that makes no statistical sense. A clean sweep in all seven swing states.
The fall of the Blue Wall. Eighty-eight counties flipped red—not one flipped blue.
Every victory landed just under the threshold that would trigger an automatic recount. Donald Trump outperformed expectations in down-ballot races with margins never before seen—while Kamala Harris simultaneously underperformed in those exact same areas.
If one were to accept these results at face value—Donald Trump, a 34-count convicted felon, supposedly outperformed Ronald Reagan. According to the co-founder of the Election Truth Alliance:
“These anomalies didn’t happen nationwide. They didn’t even happen across all voting methods—this just doesn’t reflect human voting behavior.”
They were concentrated.
Targeted.
Specific to swing states and Texas—and specific to Election Day voting.
And the supposed explanation? “Her policies were unpopular.”
Let’s think this through logically. We’re supposed to believe that in all the battleground states, Democratic voters were so disillusioned by Vice President Harris’s platform that they voted blue down ballot—but flipped to Trump at the top of the ticket?
Not in early voting.
Not by mail.
With exception to Nevada, only on Election Day.
And only after a certain threshold of ballots had been cast—where VP Harris’s numbers begin to diverge from her own party, and Trump’s suddenly begin to surge. As President Biden would say, “C’mon, man.”
In the world of election data analysis, there’s a term for that: vote-flipping algorithm.
...
And of course, Donald Trump himself:
He spent a year telling his followers he didn’t need their votes—at one point stating,
“...in four years, you don't have to vote again. We'll have it fixed so good, you're not gonna have to vote.”
Here's my view from Texas regarding Talarico: No, he most certainly cannot turn Texas Blue. No one person or thing can do that. Political hobbyists outside Texas need to stop trying to find that magic potion. Texas contains a multitude of political calculations and competing goals. The first thing to do is step back and accept that unless you are from a state, you are missing a ton of inside political knowledge. And also each state's constitution and laws are not necessarily carbon copies of the US Constitution and laws. For instance, the Texas governor has very little power. That power lies with the Lt. Governor. The governor and lt. governor do not run as a ticket and are frequently rivals. The Texas Attorney General is nothing like the head of the DOJ. In fact, the AG Office is a civil enforcement agency with little to no criminal jurisdiction. Republicans exploit people's misunderstanding of government to simply grab power they do not have.
That said, Talarico is polished in exactly the same way Bill Clinton is polished. He can present complex concepts in an easy-going Southern way.That Southerness may rub some people the wrong way, but it plays very well in Texas. He is a throwback to something this country seems to have lost - the kind of local politician who lives and works in your community. He is the kind of politician you run into on the street and discuss the weather and matters of public concern. If Democrats find politicians who are genuinely a Talarico in context of each unique local community, then they may be able to come close to a magic potion for those local races. Do that enough over time and then the state flips.
Talarico is a teacher. He understands very well how to use teaching techniques in politics. Excellent skill set. He is seminary student, not yet a preacher. Because the Texas lege only meets every two years, he has plenty of time to pursue his education. He is the grandson of a Baptist minister. However well people respond to his Christianity, let us not forget he has virtuallly no political experience. He is a newbie. Remember how Jimmy Carter was beloved as a person but panned as he failed to garner public support once in office?
Texas and other Red states will turn Blue when National Democrats stop basically agreeing with Republicans that we are all just a bunch of dumb hicks. National Democrats wrote off all the Red states as hopelessly conservative and reactionary. National Republicans decided all Red states were hopelessly conservative and reactionary and that they could exploit that to usher in authoritarianism.
On the topic of new Democratic candidates, I've heard you at least once and possibly more than once take a shot at Michichan's Mallory McMorrow. DO you have something against her or am I just misunderstanding you?
I heard her on Tim Miller’s pod a few months ago. I was not impressed. I was left asking myself “what does she stand for? What does she believe in?”
She’s really good at attracting attention because she makes lots of noise. As you know, squeaky wheels get the grease so I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s the junior Senator in Michigan come 2027. (God, what a pair, her and Slotkin!)
What does "calls off the midterms" mean? Does that mean that the New York State Board of Elections doesn't hold elections for the congressional seats in New York?
I'm just asking about what the Dems should do if the elections are cancelled or postponed for any trumped up (excuse the expanded use of the word trump) reason. It's been done before because of an autocrats fear of losing power.
I think what BZ was getting at is that - elections are local, county, events. Your county runs your elections under state law. The Feds can't legally stop an election.
Of course, I know that. Hahaha, I have a doctorate in American Studies! All I'm saying, is that with all the law breaking and norm breaking by MAGA over the last ten years, why anyone would think the midterms going forward as usual is a given, amazes me. One scenario comes to mind: Trump attacks another country (say Iran?) and then claims we're at war and the midterms shouldn't go forward right now. What do the red states do? They follow Trump. What does the Congress do? They follow Trump. This would undermine any kind of normal election that the Dems might win. Voila! Full autocracy enforced by an expanded ICE. Call me pessimistic, but I'd like to know what the DEMS would do.
Under you scenario I would guess red states would follow Trump by suspending their elections and blue states would proceed with their elections. Then the 2 sides would fight over if/how to seat the newly elected Congressional candidates from blue states. At that point you're pretty much at civil war.
This is what I hope for the most.
"Swift criminal justice for as many lawbreakers within the Miller regime as we can find (up to and including Miller)."
It's a sad irony that your great grandmother escaped Nazis and Miller's great great grandfather left pogroms in the Pale of Settlement. You grew up to be an honorable man, and Miller grew up to be a putz.
I'm glad you're wife wants to stay and fight. Me too.
So glad youre a voice I regularly read and I deeply appreciate your perspective. Thanks for your work! Im grateful to learn from you.
I enjoy your work and look forward to reading it. But I also am convinced that to dislodge this fascistic regime (all 3 branches and red states) will require a cataclysm of epic proportions (a real pandemic, an economic catastrophe) that will create the space for a charismatic left populist to seize the public imagination.
2026 elex will be at best a holding action with a Dem House maybe able to cut spending on the police state and holding some high profile hearings/lynchings.
Re the second letter:
Yes, it sucks that some Democrats were cowards and didn't confirm Mangi in 2024. But there is also a second vacancy on the Third Circuit (created by the retirement of George W. Bush appointee Kent Jordan in Jan 2025), so even if Mangi had been confirmed, Trump still could have nominated Bove to that other seat.
Brian said “ I have a pretty high threshold for danger”
And you have the scars on your abdomen to prove it!
I watched Slotkin venture out and give an interview to Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti at Breaking Points. Boy it was rough for Slotkin and it is a perfect demonstration of why Dems can’t engage in podcast world/new media: https://youtu.be/AFrEJTFbSTc?si=XykXMkIiY7lC0kKJ
I can’t get over Slotkin thinking she’s going to venture out to court the youngs on the internet and choosing a left-right show thinking it’s centrist and getting grilled on Israel from both the left and right on BreakingPoints. IMO the Dem nominee for 2028 should be able to take the heat and navigate all spaces and I don’t think Slotkin is presidential material.
Re the first letter:
I don't agree with the premise of "only to be swept out of power by a public that thinks there was overreach".
In 2016, I believed that the Senate Republicans would pay an electoral price for their stonewalling of the Merrick Garland nomination. I was wrong. I have since come to see the error of my ways, and realized that most voters (or at least swing voters) don't care about this kind of inside baseball the way we (anyone reading this) do. That is, the theft of the SCOTUS seat in 2016 outraged a lot of Democrats who were already going to vote Democratic, and future Democrats adding four seats to SCOTUS in 2029 will outrage a lot of Republicans who were already going to vote Republican, but that won't make a difference to the electoral outcome.
In response to Michael's "it does the Democrats no good at all to get a brief fleeting trifecta, add 4 justices to the court, only to be swept out of power by a public that thinks there was overreach."
The Trump/MAGA gang has shown that there are no consequences for breaking the law when you have enough power. If Democrats ever get back into power (a big 'if'), they have to stay in power, regardless whether or not some of the public think they have overreached. Has the Trump/MAGA crime gang overreached? You bet they have. But who's going to stop them? So far, no one. That's what Dems. in power need to ask themselves when they are 'overreaching' to protect what's left of our democracy. 'Who's going to stop us?' The only way out of this political doom loop is bold action - something the current Dem. leadership look incapable of.
Thank you to everyone for your wonderful questions and Brian for your answers. I think your response to Charles Hoods question could be a separate essay in itself, so many points from previous essays outlined together in your answer, how we reshape our future. I am glad you Great Great Grandparents were able to get out. My immediate family left between 1891 and 1914. Those family members who remained from both my mom (Hungary) and dad's (Austrian Galicia) side who I have been able to locate thru Yad Vashem and the Shoah Foundation were not that fortunate during WWII
Just say the words "Joe Manchin was the greatest gift ever granted Democrats and emulating him is the only path to Senate control."
I would if it weren’t mindless fanfic!
1. Saying Mangi’s nomination stalled after some Republicans complained about his religion tells only part of the story. Cortez-Masto, Manchin, and Rosen, all Democrats, opposed Mangi’s appointment. Bove’s appointment is as much a product of their cowardice as that of the Republicans.
2. Slotkin has a reputation of overcoming the Democrats’ reputation for being weak-kneed and wishy washy. There is rarely, if ever, an explanation for why Harris received more Michigan votes than Slotkin.
Sorry for the length of this but couldn't find a way to link to the original post, about, as I have believed, the election was stolen. Wondering if you could verify?:
"The missing votes uncovered in Smart Elections’ legal case in Rockland County, New York, are just the tip of the iceberg—an iceberg that extends across the swing states and into Texas.
On Monday, an investigator’s story finally hit the news cycle: Pro V&V, one of only two federally accredited testing labs, approved sweeping last-minute updates to ES&S voting machines in the months leading up to the 2024 election—without independent testing, public disclosure, or full certification review.
These changes were labeled “de minimis”—a term meant for trivial tweaks. But they touched ballot scanners, altered reporting software, and modified audit files—yet were all rubber-stamped with no oversight.
That revelation is a shock to the public.
But for those who’ve been digging into the bizarre election data since November, this isn’t the headline—it’s the final piece to the puzzle. While Pro V&V was quietly updating equipment in plain sight, a parallel operation was unfolding behind the curtain—between tech giants and Donald Trump.
And it started with a long forgotten sale.
A Power Cord Becomes a Backdoor
In March 2021, Leonard Leo—the judicial kingmaker behind the modern conservative legal machine—sold a quiet Chicago company by the name of Tripp Lite for $1.65 billion. The buyer: Eaton Corporation, a global power infrastructure conglomerate that just happened to have a partnership with Peter Thiel’s Palantir.
To most, Tripp Lite was just a hardware brand—battery backups, surge protectors, power strips. But in America’s elections, Tripp Lite devices were something else entirely.
They are physically connected to ES&S central tabulators and Electionware servers, and Dominion tabulators and central servers across the country. And they aren’t dumb devices. They are smart UPS units—programmable, updatable, and capable of communicating directly with the election system via USB, serial port, or Ethernet.
ES&S systems, including central tabulators and Electionware servers, rely on Tripp Lite UPS devices. ES&S’s Electionware suite runs on Windows OS, which automatically trusts connected UPS hardware.
If Eaton pushed an update to those UPS units, it could have gained root-level access to the host tabulation environment—without ever modifying certified election software.
In Dominion’s Democracy Suite 5.17, the drivers for these UPS units are listed as “optional”—meaning they can be updated remotely without triggering certification requirements or oversight. Optional means unregulated. Unregulated means invisible. And invisible means perfect for infiltration.
...
Enter the ballot scrubbing platform BallotProof. Co-created by Ethan Shaotran, a longtime employee of Elon Musk and current DOGE employee, BallotProof was pitched as a transparency solution—an app to “verify” scanned ballot images and support election integrity.
With Palantir's AI controlling the backend, and BallotProof cleaning the front, only one thing was missing: the signal to go live.
September 2024: Eaton and Musk Make It Official
Then came the final public breadcrumb:
In September 2024, Eaton formally partnered with Elon Musk.
The stated purpose? A vague, forward-looking collaboration focused on “grid resilience” and “next-generation communications.”
But buried in the partnership documents was this line:
“Exploring integration with Starlink's emerging low-orbit DTC infrastructure for secure operational continuity.”
The Activation: Starlink Goes Direct-to-Cell
That signal came on October 30, 2024—just days before the election, Musk activated 265 brand new low Earth orbit (LEO) V2 Mini satellites, each equipped with Direct-to-Cell (DTC) technology capable of processing, routing, and manipulating real-time data, including voting data, through his satellite network.
DTC doesn’t require routers, towers, or a traditional SIM. It connects directly from satellite to any compatible device—including embedded modems in “air-gapped” voting systems, smart UPS units, or unsecured auxiliary hardware.
From that moment on:
- Commands could be sent from orbit
- Patch delivery became invisible to domestic monitors
- Compromised devices could be triggered remotely
This groundbreaking project that should have taken two-plus years to build, was completed in just under ten months.
Elon Musk boasts endlessly about everything he’s launching, building, buying—or even just thinking about—whether it’s real or not. But he pulls off one of the largest and fastest technological feats in modern day history… and says nothing? One might think that was kind of… “weird.”
According to New York Times reporting, on October 5—just before Starlink’s DTC activation—Musk texted a confidant:
“I’m feeling more optimistic after tonight. Tomorrow we unleash the anomaly in the matrix.”
Then, an hour later:
“This isn’t something on the chessboard, so they’ll be quite surprised. ‘Lasers’ from space.”
It read like a riddle. In hindsight, it was a blueprint.
...
The Outcome
Data that makes no statistical sense. A clean sweep in all seven swing states.
The fall of the Blue Wall. Eighty-eight counties flipped red—not one flipped blue.
Every victory landed just under the threshold that would trigger an automatic recount. Donald Trump outperformed expectations in down-ballot races with margins never before seen—while Kamala Harris simultaneously underperformed in those exact same areas.
If one were to accept these results at face value—Donald Trump, a 34-count convicted felon, supposedly outperformed Ronald Reagan. According to the co-founder of the Election Truth Alliance:
“These anomalies didn’t happen nationwide. They didn’t even happen across all voting methods—this just doesn’t reflect human voting behavior.”
They were concentrated.
Targeted.
Specific to swing states and Texas—and specific to Election Day voting.
And the supposed explanation? “Her policies were unpopular.”
Let’s think this through logically. We’re supposed to believe that in all the battleground states, Democratic voters were so disillusioned by Vice President Harris’s platform that they voted blue down ballot—but flipped to Trump at the top of the ticket?
Not in early voting.
Not by mail.
With exception to Nevada, only on Election Day.
And only after a certain threshold of ballots had been cast—where VP Harris’s numbers begin to diverge from her own party, and Trump’s suddenly begin to surge. As President Biden would say, “C’mon, man.”
In the world of election data analysis, there’s a term for that: vote-flipping algorithm.
...
And of course, Donald Trump himself:
He spent a year telling his followers he didn’t need their votes—at one point stating,
“...in four years, you don't have to vote again. We'll have it fixed so good, you're not gonna have to vote.”
Here's my view from Texas regarding Talarico: No, he most certainly cannot turn Texas Blue. No one person or thing can do that. Political hobbyists outside Texas need to stop trying to find that magic potion. Texas contains a multitude of political calculations and competing goals. The first thing to do is step back and accept that unless you are from a state, you are missing a ton of inside political knowledge. And also each state's constitution and laws are not necessarily carbon copies of the US Constitution and laws. For instance, the Texas governor has very little power. That power lies with the Lt. Governor. The governor and lt. governor do not run as a ticket and are frequently rivals. The Texas Attorney General is nothing like the head of the DOJ. In fact, the AG Office is a civil enforcement agency with little to no criminal jurisdiction. Republicans exploit people's misunderstanding of government to simply grab power they do not have.
That said, Talarico is polished in exactly the same way Bill Clinton is polished. He can present complex concepts in an easy-going Southern way.That Southerness may rub some people the wrong way, but it plays very well in Texas. He is a throwback to something this country seems to have lost - the kind of local politician who lives and works in your community. He is the kind of politician you run into on the street and discuss the weather and matters of public concern. If Democrats find politicians who are genuinely a Talarico in context of each unique local community, then they may be able to come close to a magic potion for those local races. Do that enough over time and then the state flips.
Talarico is a teacher. He understands very well how to use teaching techniques in politics. Excellent skill set. He is seminary student, not yet a preacher. Because the Texas lege only meets every two years, he has plenty of time to pursue his education. He is the grandson of a Baptist minister. However well people respond to his Christianity, let us not forget he has virtuallly no political experience. He is a newbie. Remember how Jimmy Carter was beloved as a person but panned as he failed to garner public support once in office?
Texas and other Red states will turn Blue when National Democrats stop basically agreeing with Republicans that we are all just a bunch of dumb hicks. National Democrats wrote off all the Red states as hopelessly conservative and reactionary. National Republicans decided all Red states were hopelessly conservative and reactionary and that they could exploit that to usher in authoritarianism.
On the topic of new Democratic candidates, I've heard you at least once and possibly more than once take a shot at Michichan's Mallory McMorrow. DO you have something against her or am I just misunderstanding you?
I heard her on Tim Miller’s pod a few months ago. I was not impressed. I was left asking myself “what does she stand for? What does she believe in?”
She’s really good at attracting attention because she makes lots of noise. As you know, squeaky wheels get the grease so I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s the junior Senator in Michigan come 2027. (God, what a pair, her and Slotkin!)
The interview Slotkin did on Breaking Points was extremely cathartic. She needed an ego check.
My question for you for next time: What should the Dems do if Trump calls off the midterms (for whatever reason) and the Republicans support it?
What does "calls off the midterms" mean? Does that mean that the New York State Board of Elections doesn't hold elections for the congressional seats in New York?
I'm just asking about what the Dems should do if the elections are cancelled or postponed for any trumped up (excuse the expanded use of the word trump) reason. It's been done before because of an autocrats fear of losing power.
I think what BZ was getting at is that - elections are local, county, events. Your county runs your elections under state law. The Feds can't legally stop an election.
And I'm pointing out that in the US (unlike in many other countries), the federal government doesn't administer elections.
Of course, I know that. Hahaha, I have a doctorate in American Studies! All I'm saying, is that with all the law breaking and norm breaking by MAGA over the last ten years, why anyone would think the midterms going forward as usual is a given, amazes me. One scenario comes to mind: Trump attacks another country (say Iran?) and then claims we're at war and the midterms shouldn't go forward right now. What do the red states do? They follow Trump. What does the Congress do? They follow Trump. This would undermine any kind of normal election that the Dems might win. Voila! Full autocracy enforced by an expanded ICE. Call me pessimistic, but I'd like to know what the DEMS would do.
Under you scenario I would guess red states would follow Trump by suspending their elections and blue states would proceed with their elections. Then the 2 sides would fight over if/how to seat the newly elected Congressional candidates from blue states. At that point you're pretty much at civil war.
Yep. 😢