NYT Calls for ‘Civility,’ Runs Fiction on Trump Assassination

House elections map

An interesting analysis worth clicking over

Joel Kotkin:

“…Over the past few decades, the U.S. has developed essentially two economies. On the one side is the widely celebrated “post-industrial” economy: software, entertainment, media, and financial and business services. These sectors flourished as the stock market soared in the ultra-low interest-rate environment fostered by the Obama administration, whose recovery strategy was built around bailing out major banks, all headquartered in deep-blue cities. The winners under Obama included urban real estate, financial-service firms, and the tech oligarchs. These elements now constitute the Democratic Party’s burgeoning financial base, allowing it consistently to spend more than the GOP in key congressional races, while the GOP still gains support in energy and other less heralded “legacy” industries.

There’s a glitter gap between the parties, too. The Democrats now own the fashion, media, literary, and entertainment communities, in the process turning the putative party of the common man into the political vehicle of the leisure class. In contrast, during the depth of the recession, a much larger, more dispersed America struggled. As traditional industries like manufacturing, energy, agriculture, home construction, and basic business services declined, the progressive clerisy in forums like Slate crowed that these blue-collar jobs were never coming back. Unlike the tech oligarchy or the financial giants, these older sectors wielded little political influence under Obama and, in the case of energy, seemed destined for a radical downsizing.

These heritage industries and the people who work in them elected Trump. Despite repeated tales of how tariffs are destroying manufacturers, the industrial sector, after weakening at the end of Obama’s term, has been enjoying its best growth since the mid-1990s. Critically, incomes are up for the lower deciles of the labor force, including young workers. Nothing guarantees that this recovery will continue, but Trump can justifiably boast about accomplishing what Obama failed to deliver in eight years. Democrats might mutter that renewed growth has come from regulatory reforms and big corporate tax breaks, but that makes Trump’s point: a continuance of Obama-style economic and regulatory policy would have hurt most Americans outside of Wall Street and Silicon Valley.

Despite the media’s national obsession with gender and race, American politics continues to follow broad geographic and economic lines. The battle lines have changed over time, from a conflict between coastal merchants and southern farmers to splits over tariffs between western farmers and eastern financiers, and eventually to the battle between an ascendant Sunbelt and struggling older states in the northeast. Today we have a new divide, what might be described as the “tangible” sector versus the ephemeral; the French Marxist economist Thomas Piketty has aptly called it “the brahmin left against the merchant right.” One economy trades in digits, images, and financial transactions, the other in real goods such as cars, steel, oil, gas, and food. These economic sectors have often radically different imperatives.

The Bay Area economy, for example, depends on noncitizens for as much as 40 percent of its workforce, including relatively cheap, work-visa-shackled, latter-day indentured servants from Asia. This explains why Trump’s travel ban and other, often crude or insufficiently justified moves on immigration have helped transform Silicon Valley into a one-party political goldmine. This software-dominated economy, along with its cousins in Hollywood and finance, also is far less exposed to regulatory excesses than firms in manufacturing, home-building, or energy. Tech servers can be located in low-cost regions like the Pacific Northwest or the South, while manufacturing, highly sensitive to environmental regulation and electricity prices, has been relocated to places like Texas or the Midwest—or preferably to China—so that firms can produce gadgets without expanding their localized “carbon footprint.”

Any return to Obama’s energy policy—or the even more extreme one enacted in California—could set back the economic recovery in much of the country, most notably Appalachia, but also across the energy belt that extends from the Permian Basin and the Gulf to the Bakken fields in North Dakota. Even Democratic Texas senate candidate Beto O’Rourke, who in the past supported a $10 a barrel tax on oil, has a tough task justifying his position in oil-rich Texas.

The tangible and ephemeral economies create distinct political trajectories. In Texas or Tennessee, for example, working-class people can get decent jobs and aspire to homeownership and other aspects of middle-class life. Historically, Democrats and Republicans in these regions favored robust economic growth, battling mainly over how to achieve it. But today, a pro-growth bipartisan consensus is increasingly elusive, as Democrats adopt the environmental and lifestyle preferences of their often childless urban base. Superstar firebrands like Democratic congressional aspirant Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez can talk about going on a war footing to fight global warming because there’s not much industry left in her district in Queens and the Bronx…”

https://www.city-journal.org/socioeconomic-divide-will-shape-midterm-elections

Former Democratic Party leader paid women in alleged Tarrant voter fraud ring, AG says.

“…A Fort Worth woman recently indicted on voter fraud charges paid others involved in the scheme with funds provided by a former Tarrant County Democratic Party leader, court documents filed this week show.

After learning about a state investigation, Leticia Sanchez — one of four women arrested and indicted on voter fraud charges — allegedly directed her daughter to send a text message to others in the scheme, urging them not to cooperate with investigators, state officials say.

The allegations are made in a state’s notice of intent to introduce evidence in Sanchez’s criminal case, where state officials say she was among those who collaborated to vote for certain down-ballot candidates on a number of north side residents’ mail-in ballots…”

https://www.wfaa.com/article/news/local/tarrant-county/former-democratic-party-leader-paid-women-in-alleged-tarrant-voter-fraud-ring-ag-says/287-607741134

“…Here’s just one tidbit from California’s housing affordability crisis: According to the US Department of Housing and Urban Development, families in the northern California counties of San Francisco, San Mateo, and Marin who make as much as $117,000 a year are eligible to live in low-income housing projects. Want another one or two? Well, here you go: California’s median home value has increased by almost 80 percent to $544,900 since 2011, while more than half of renters spend more than 30 percent of their income on housing.

Not that there’s much of a mystery of what’s really happening. As the Los Angeles Times notes, “Academic researchers, state analysts and California’s gubernatorial candidates agree that the fundamental issue underlying the state’s housing crisis is that there are not enough homes for everyone who wants to live here.”

A few examples: UCLA researchers find, “Opposition to new housing and increased housing density are major components of California’s current housing problem. In many of the state’s cities a vast majority of residential land is zoned only for single-family housing, which drastically limits potential supply.” Likewise, experts at UC Berkeley conclude that “it is clear that supply matters, and there is an urgent need to expand supply in equitable and environmentally sustainable ways.”…”

https://ricochet.com/565600/california-has-a-housing-crisis-and-cant-figure-out-how-to-solve-it/

AND THE HITS JUST KEEP ON COMING: Arizona state troopers withdraw Kyrsten Sinema endorsement after members object.

Related: “‘It was Rousseau,’ writes Frank M. Turner in European Intellectual History from Rousseau to Nietzsche, ‘who made the hatred of one’s own culture the stance of the cultivated person.’ The Rousseau of Arizona is the alternately contemptuous and clownish Kyrsten Sinema, who is trying to persuade Arizonans to overlook her well-documented contempt for the state and tap her to be one of its two U.S. senators.”

“…The biggest of the Big Tech companies are quickly positioning themselves as the internet’s thought police, threatening to stamp out one of America’s most cherished freedoms — the right to free speech…”

https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2018/10/23/exclusive-brad-parscale-big-tech-is-meddling-with-free-speech-and-elections/

Listen to the media and democrats, Trump is literally Hitler for sharing these same beliefs!

Charles Glaser:

WE WILL BE THE ARBITER OF WHAT FACTS ARE IMPORTANT, YOU IGNORANT PEASANT: How very insightful of The Washington Post to carefully neglect telling readers that KKK founder Nathan Bedford Forrest was a delegate at the 1868 Democratic Convention (or that the democrat party worked in cahoots with the KKK to maintain white control). More surprising yet is the reporter, Lisa Rein, (lisa.rein@washpost.com) claims to have a degree in History.

Original Story

I agree with President Obama 100%! pic.twitter.com/PI3aW1Zh5Q

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 23, 2018

Voter Registration Application Sent To Dallas Woman Who Died 29 Years Ago

A good article on the reality of politics and the maturity required to operate at the highest levels.

Byron York:

“…Two years and five months ago, on the day of the Indiana Republican primary that ended his presidential campaign, Ted Cruz unloaded on Donald Trump. It was more than an unloading — Cruz disgorged months of resentment against the man who defeated him and attacked his wife, his father, and his character. Trump was a “pathological liar,” Cruz told reporters, a “bully,” a “narcissist,” an “utterly amoral” man who acted from “a deep yawning cavern of insecurity.” Cruz took his anger at Trump to the Republican National Convention and beyond.

By Election Day 2016, Cruz had come to an uneasy support of his party’s presidential nominee. And then Trump won. So on Monday night, at the Toyota Center in Houston, there was Cruz, introducing Trump with fulsome praise.

“I’m proud to have worked with President Trump on the biggest tax cut in a generation,” Cruz said.

“I’m proud to have worked hand-in-hand with President Trump to repeal job-killing regulations.”

“I’m honored that President Trump is here endorsing and supporting my campaign,” Cruz declared, “and I look forward to campaigning alongside him in 2020 for his re-election as president of the United States.”

Was it hypocrisy? A lack of principles? Plenty of observers would be happy to charge Cruz with those sins and more. But that’s not what was going on. Say what you will about Cruz, and Trump, but there could be no greater tribute to the overwhelming power of voters in the American political system than what took place in Houston Monday.

The voters changed Cruz’s mind. He represents the voters of Texas, and wants to keep doing so, so he supports the president they support, regardless of the past. It doesn’t matter whether Cruz believes what he says deep down. What’s more important is his signal that he will do what the voters of Texas want.

Trump recognizes a fellow transactional politician when he sees one. Onstage in Houston, Trump gave a brief history of his relationship with Cruz that was the distilled essence of it’s-just-business politics.

“In just 15 days the people of Texas are going to re-elect a man who has become a really good friend of mine,” Trump said. “You know, we had our little difficulties.”

“But actually, if you remember, in the beginning, it was a love fest,” Trump continued, referring to the days in which Cruz chose to wrap his rival Trump in a “bear hug.”

Trump recalled that the press saw hypocrisy at work at the time. “Remember, they kept saying, ‘Well, when is it going to break up?’ I said, ‘Don’t worry, it’ll break up…’ And then we said, ‘You know, it’s time — that’s what has to happen.'”

“And it got nasty,” Trump said. “And then it ended.”

It would be hard to find a more concise telling of the story. In the end, it was just business.

Now, Trump said, he and Cruz get along famously. “Nobody has helped me more with your tax cuts, with your regulations, all of the things we’ve been doing with your military and your vets than Sen. Ted Cruz,” Trump told the crowd.

“He defended your jobs, he defended your borders,” Trump said of Cruz. “He defends your families, he defends your faith, and we are defending together, with a lot of other Republicans, your freedom.”

Earlier in the day, on the way to Texas, Trump rejected the nickname he gave Cruz during the campaign. “He’s not Lyin’ Ted anymore,” Trump said. “He’s Beautiful Ted. I call him Texas Ted.”

After a brief scare, Cruz seems to be in control of his re-election race. Cruz has led Democratic rival Beto O’Rourke in all 17 of the polls in the RealClearPolitics average of polls dating back to April. But in August, things got a little close, and the White House made plans for the president to visit Texas on Cruz’s behalf.

Lately, Cruz has been back up. In the last three surveys, by CNN, the New York Times, and Quinnipiac, Cruz has led O’Rourke by seven, eight, and nine points, respectively.

The man who came up with “Lyin’ Ted” turned his sights on O’Rourke Monday night. “Ted’s opponent in this race is a stone-cold phony named Robert Francis O’Rourke, sometimes referred to as ‘Beto,'” Trump told the crowd. “He pretends to be a moderate, but he’s actually a radical, open-borders left-winger.”

Does anyone think the phrase “stone-cold phony” might occasionally reappear in the campaign between now and election day, courtesy of the president?

Monday night’s rally marked another stage in the relationship between Trump and Cruz. They have been through a lot, openly loathed each other, and are now virtually composing love songs for each other. Who cares what they really think? The voters made it happen…”

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/byron-york-in-texas-trump-and-cruz-complete-the-transaction

Brendan Kirby:

1.) History favors the party out of the White House.

2.) President Donald Trump’s approval rating is low.

3.) Republicans are defending many more open seats.

4.) Democrats are winning the money race.

5.) The polls favor Democrats.

6.) Democrats have outperformed Republicans in special elections.

https://www.lifezette.com/2018/10/six-reasons-why-republicans-should-still-worry-about-midterms

Don’t get cocky, kid.

“…President Donald Trump’s approval rating has reached a new high, even as likely voters favor Democrats by 9 points to lead Congress, a new poll from NBC News and The Wall Street Journal found.

The poll found that 47 percent of respondents approve of the job Trump is doing as president, while 49 percent disapprove. That is the best he has done in the NBC/WSJ poll since taking office. And it represents a major jump in the president’s popularity; the same poll found him with a 39 percent approval rating six months ago. 

Although Democrats maintained a sizable lead among likely voters – 50 percent said they would prefer a Democrat-controlled Congress, and 41 percent would like to see the Republicans keep their majority – the poll found that Democrats’ advantage disappeared in the most competitive districts. In the hotly contested races, the party preference numbers are closer to even, the Journal reported…”

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2018/10/22/nbc-wsj-poll/1726244002/

Cue the banshee cries that Trump causes hurricanes!

Paul Mirengoff:

“…Did you know that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran’s former president, is on Twitter? It’s true.

On his Twitter account, Ahmadinejad describes himself as “Husband, Dad, Grandfather, University Professor, President, Mayor, Proud Iranian.” A better description would be “Jew hater, Holocaust denier, homophobe, serial human rights violator, and Death to America advocate.”

There’s a place on Twitter for a guy like that, but not for the Gay Patriot.

Is Ahmadinejad softening on America, though? This weekend, the following tweet appeared on his feed:

Watched highlights of the @UMichFootball and @MSU_Football great effort by both teams; as always a hard work ethic pays off.

‏But Ahmadinejad also tweeted favorably about the Black Panthers, a gang of thug revolutionaries from yesteryear. The “professor” wrote:

One of the main objectives of the #BlackPantherParty was feeding the hungry; which did not sit well with the #UnitedStatesGovernment.

Our government had nothing against feeding the hungry. What didn’t sit well was the Panthers’ murderous criminality and desire to overthrow the U.S. government through armed insurrection. No wonder Ahmadinejad has reached into the dustbin of history and praised the Black Panthers on Twitter (though an outfit like the Panthers would be quickly and violently suppressed in Ahmadinejad’s Iran).

“Death to America” still seems to be Ahmadinejad’s desire. But maybe he would exempt Michigan, or at least the Spartans and the Wolverines…”

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2018/10/twitter-yes-to-ahmadinejad-no-to-the-gay-patriot.php

“Can a bureaucracy bankrupt a business for its unpopular beliefs?”

Julie Kelly:

“…Just as Democrats try to woo suburban moms ahead of next month’s election, along comes Rep. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) to remind us how much the Left hates us.

Sinema is running against her Republican House colleague, Rep. Martha McSally, for the open seat vacated by retiring Arizona Senator Jeff Flake. The 42-year-old unmarried bisexual atheist lawyer with a Ph.D. in Justice Studies has some interesting views on life, as you might imagine.

She once wrote that capitalism poses a danger to Americans; she was an anti-war activist in the early 2000s—one of her protest groups distributed flyers portraying U.S. soldiers as skeletons with automatic rifles; she summoned witches to one anti-war stunt; and she mocks her own (adopted) home state as a “meth lab of democracy” whose residents are “crazy.”

Not exactly a winning campaign message when you’re running in Arizona.

But it’s her 2006 profane comments ridiculing stay-at-home moms that now pose a major problem for her party, and could very well cost her the election. Then-state representative Sinema questioned the feminist cred of women who don’t work outside the home and instead chose to care for their families. “These women who act like staying at home, leeching off their husbands or boyfriends, and just cashing the checks is some sort of feminism because they’re choosing to live that life,” Sinema said during an interview with a Scottsdale magazine. “That’s bullshit. I mean, what the f— are we really talking about here?…”

https://amgreatness.com/2018/10/22/kyrsten-sinema-reminds-us-that-democrats-hate-housewives

This is a clear message to China

“…The U.S. sailed two guided-missile warships through the Strait of Taiwan Monday, in what Taipei’s ministry of defense described as a routine passage through international waters.

Officials in Beijing have yet to comment on passage of the American destroyer and cruiser, but in the past the Chinese government has taken a hard line against Navy vessels transiting the waterway separating mainland China from Taiwan.

China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has vowed to conquer it by force, if necessary…”

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2018/10/22/two-navy-warships-transit-taiwan-strait/