The Commentariat -- June 26, 2016
The "Special Relationship" Frays. Julian Borger of the Guardian: "When [President Obama} came to Britain in April to help make the case for the remain camp, he warned that, if the UK left the EU, it would have to go to the back of the queue for a deal like the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) being negotiated between Washington and Brussels. The White House made clear on Friday that the threat he made then still stuck. 'Obviously, the president stands by what he said and I don't have an update of our position,' spokesman Eric Schulz told reporters.... Reactions from the rest of the world's leaders ranged from trepidation to thinly disguised glee in Moscow and Tehran." -- CW ...
... AFP: "Top US diplomat John Kerry will fly to Brussels and London on Monday for talks with Washington's key allies in the aftermath of Britain's vote to leave the European Union. US officials travelling to Rome with the secretary of state told reporters on the flight that two stops had been added to his European itinerary at the last moment." -- CW ...
... Adam Taylor of the Washington Post: "A petition calling for another referendum on whether Britain should stay in the European Union has now received at least 2.1 million signatures -- a level that means it must now be debated by British politicians. It was apparently so popular that the British Parliament's website, where the petition was hosted, briefly crashed.... This referendum was only called in a bid by Prime Minister David Cameron to calm tensions over the E.U. within his own Conservative Party ahead of a general election. Cameron thought he could win. Obviously he was completely mistaken.... Meanwhile, Britain has not yet triggered Article 50 -- the procedure for actually leaving the E.U. -- and there are signs it may try to delay doing so as long as possible." -- CW ...
... Where Dimwits Prevail. Kim Soffen of the Washington Post: "Polling showed the areas that had the most to lose and the least to gain from the Brexit are precisely those where the referendum saw the most support. In other words, the places -- the most export-heavy regions -- most hurt by the economic disruptions caused by Brexit could be the places that pushed hardest for it, as this scatter plot shows." CW News Flash: Racist hurts racists, too, sometimes in the pocketbook. ...
... Let's look at idyllic Cornwall, where 56 percent of voters, along with its Members of Parliament voted to leave. Rick Noack of the Washington Post: "The county is heavily dependent on the more than 60 million British pounds ($82 million) in E.U. subsidies per year that are transferred to the region and that have helped finance infrastructure projects and education schemes. Now, county officials are panicking -- fearing the worst for the county's future and wondering why one of the most E.U.-dependent counties in Britain voted against the E.U. -- and its money." -- CW ...
... Tara Palmeri of Politico: "According to a poll, commissioned by the Sunday Times, support for Scotland to break away from the U.K. has risen by seven points since Scotland's independence referendum last year. More than 52 percent now say they'd leave while 48 percent would vote to stay in the U.K." -- CW
... The Guardian is liveblogging more fallout from the Brexit vote, including a Labour party crash-and-burn. -- CW
Michael Olivas, in a Los Angeles Times op-ed, explains why the Supreme Court's failure to rule on President Obama's executive action re: undocumented immigrants is not a decision & that -- eventually -- a full Court might act in (probably a future) president's favor. In the meantime, "the deadlock in the court only underlines the pressing need for Congress to act on comprehensive immigration reform. The real malefactors on immigration aren't the Supreme Court justices, but the House and Senate." -- CW
Sarah Kaplan of the Washington Post: "Conservative columnist George Will has left the Republican Party over its presumptive nomination of Donald Trump. Will, who writes a column for The Washington Post, spoke about his decision Friday at an event for the Federalist Society in Washington. 'This is not my party,' he told the audience, the news site PJ Media first reported. Speaking with The Post, Will said that he changed his voter registration from 'Republican' to 'unaffiliated' several weeks ago, the day after House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) endorsed Trump." ...
... CW: A moment in Reality Chex history: the first time George Will made the Commentariat two days running. The interesting bit: Ryan, may have ticked off more than half the Republican base with his half-baked endorsement of Trump: Trump supporters must be irritated by his continuing dissing of Trump, while anti-Trump establishment types like Will found the endorsement appalling. ...
... Update. Trump tweets back: "George Will, one of the most overrated political pundits (who lost his way long ago), has left the Republican Party.He's made many bad calls" -- CW
Presidential Race
Ken Thomas of the AP: "A draft of the Democratic Party's policy positions reflects the influence of Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign: endorsing steps to break up large Wall Street banks, advocating a $15 hourly wage, urging an end to the death penalty. Hillary Clinton's supporters turned back efforts by Sanders' allies to promote a Medicare-for-all single-payer health care system and a carbon tax to address climate change, and freeze hydraulic fracking. While the platform does not bind the Democratic nominee to the stated positions, it serves as a guidepost for the party moving forward. Party officials approved the draft early Saturday." -- CW
Brexit Makes the U.S. the Last, Best Hope for Liberalism. Benjamin Wallace-Wells of the New Yorker: "The Democrats have become the party of vocal American exceptionalism. This is partly a direct response to Donald Trump's paranoid claims that the United States is a 'third-world country' and the subject of collective global mockery. But it's also the case that, against the nationalism rising across Europe and at home, American liberalism does look more isolated, and more singular.... One irony of [Hillary] Clinton's candidacy is that she is projecting a globalism not obviously shared by others around the globe -- not even by America's most traditional ally. The liberal project is increasingly an American one." -- CW ...
... Patrick Healy of the New York Times: "... Hillary Clinton ... shares more with the defeated 'Remain' campaign than just their common slogan, 'Stronger Together.' Her fundamental argument, much akin to Prime Minister David Cameron's against British withdrawal from the European Union, is that Americans should value stability and incremental change over the risks entailed in radical change and the possibility of chaos if Donald J. Trump wins the presidency.... According to their friends and advisers, Mrs. Clinton and former President Bill Clinton have worried for months that she was out of sync with the mood of the electorate, and that her politically safe messages ... were far less compelling to frustrated voters than the 'political revolution' of Senator Bernie Sanders or Mr. Trump's grievance-driven promise to 'Make America Great Again.' Mr. Sanders and Mr. Trump won a combined 25 million votes during the primary season, compared with 16 million for Mrs. Clinton." -- CW
I speak to foreign policy advisors all the time. But the advice has to come from me.... These people don't have it. Honestly, most of them are no good. Let's go to the 14th! -- Donald Trump, Saturday
You know, they're advisers, they're like everybody else. They probably know less, every one of these advisers. -- Donald Trump, Saturday
I've been in touch with them [his foreign policy advisors] there's nothing to talk about. -- Donald Trump, Friday, in reply to a question about whether or not he'd spoken to advisors about Brexit
When Trump says "they know less," he means "they know less than I do." (Trump has a habit of dropping predicates, as in "I renounce.") Several high-profile Republicans, in backing Trump, have claimed that Congress & the professional bureaucracy (like the Pentagon) would constrain a President Trump's impulsiveness. Clearly, they will not. Trump is certain he "knows more" than any of these lesser gods, and he would do whatever he thought, in his glorious ignorance, that "best" thing might be. -- Constant Weader
Ashley Parker of the New York Times: On Saturday, at a Trump-owned golf course in Balmedie, Scotland, the course's VP said "Mr. Trump would love to take advantage of the weather and give reporters a tour -- but that it would not be an opportunity for them to ask questions. But Mr. Trump quickly threw his team's plans aside, urging reporters to follow his 'golf buggy' through perhaps the 'largest dunes anywhere in the world' and answering questions along the way. At one point, when Secret Service agents tried to halt the press, Mr. Trump looked down from his perch atop a dune and hollered, 'Guys, get up here!' At each hole, Mr. Trump riffed and ad-libbed...." -- CW ...
... Muslims in Kilts Okay -- Maybe. Ali Vitali of NBC News: "Donald Trump once again muddled the points of his Muslim ban, telling reporters Saturday on the 14th hole of his Aberdeen course that it 'wouldn't bother' him if a Scottish Muslim came into the United States. But he later revised his past remarks that the proposed prohibition would be a blanket ban and is more a question of proper vetting -- with extra emphasis placed on certain countries. 'I don't want people coming in -- I don't want people coming in from certain countries,' Trump clarified to The Daily Mail.... 'I don't want people coming in from the terror countries. You have terror countries! I don't want them, unless they're very, very strongly vetted.'" -- CW
A Boor Abroad. Ewen MacAskill & Alan Yuhas of the Guardian: "The Guardian appeared on Saturday to have been barred by Donald Trump's presidential campaign after a spat the previous day.... A Guardian reporter and photographer were denied access to Trump's golf resort in Aberdeen, Scotland, on Saturday morning.... The decision had come from the highest authority, [Trump security personnel] said.... At a press conference on Friday at his Turnberry golf course in Ayrshire, Trump took offence when the Guardian asked him why UK and Scottish senior politicians had not come to meet him, suggesting it might be because he was toxic. He replied by saying the questioner was a 'nasty, nasty guy'." -- CW ...
... Here's part of the Clinton campaign's response to the Idiot Abroad:
Hours after the #BrexitVote, Donald Trump was in the U.K.
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) June 24, 2016
Talking about how he, personally, would benefit.https://t.co/YEt5LozDpt
... Cockwomble! Heather Timmons of Quartz reprints some Scots' reactions to Donald Trump's claim that Scots had "taken their country back" by voting for Brexit (which the majority didn't). Thanks to Whyte O. for the lead. -- CW
Con-Man-in-Chief. The Trumps Are Even Sleazier than You Knew. Mike McIntire of the New York Times: "'Easy target' might describe the audience for several enterprises stamped with the Trump brand that have been accused of preying upon desperation, inexperience or vanity.... [One is] Cambridge Who's Who, which generated hundreds of complaints that it deceptively peddled the promise of recognition in a registry, as well as branding and networking services of questionable value. Dozens of people who paid Trump-endorsed businesses were also sold products by Cambridge, which benefited from its partnership with Donald Trump Jr.... Cambridge employees played up the Trump association when pursuing customers.... When Donald Trump Jr. joined Cambridge, the company had already had about 400 complaints filed against it with the Better Business Bureau since 2006.... On one of several Cambridge websites for its members, a chat group ... contained an appeal to join ACN, a multilevel marketer of telecommunications and energy services that was 'endorsed by Donald Trump....' Mr. Trump's financial disclosure shows that he has collected more than $1 million in speaking fees from ACN...." -- CW
Beyond the Beltway
Marina Villeneuve of the AP: "The wife of Maine Gov. Paul LePage has taken on a summer waitressing job near their Boothbay home. And she's saving up for a Toyota RAV4. Ann LePage had kept quiet about the gig, but her husband told a crowd at a recent town hall that his wife took a job to 'supplement' his lowest-in-the-nation $70,000 salary. This year, the Republican governor unsuccessfully proposed to more than double his successor's salary to $150,000." CW: If they paid the governor what he was worth, he would have to moonlight as a waitperson.
News Ledes
New York Times: "Bill Cunningham, who turned fashion photography into his own branch of cultural anthropology on the streets of New York, chronicling an era's ever-changing social scene for The New York Times by training his busily observant lens on what people wore -- stylishly, flamboyantly or just plain sensibly -- died on Saturday in Manhattan. He was 87." -- CW
New York Times: "Michael Herr, who wrote 'Dispatches,' a glaringly intense, personal account of being a correspondent in Vietnam that is widely viewed as one of the most visceral and persuasive depictions of the unearthly experience of war, died on Thursday at a hospital near his home in Delaware County, N.Y. He was 76." -- CW
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Reader Comments (5)
Cockwomble!! Maybe we should make Scotland the 51 State.
As I have said before, so he made a comment in Scotland about their vote and was completely wrong. Why? Because he already knows the truth about everything. Seriously, dangerously mentally ill.
I have run out of words. Trump's behavior in Scotland signifies a HUGE hole in his brain where all those little white balls accumulate and clog up any cogent cells to activate. Hence we have ....see? I've run out of words.
There is something so pathetic about all this, don't you think?
And found this bit of news fascinating:
"... Where Dimwits Prevail. Kim Soffen of the Washington Post: "Polling showed the areas that had the most to lose and the least to gain from the Brexit are precisely those where the referendum saw the most support."
Sound familiar?
Brexit and DJT's continuing popularity may hark back to a line in one of Dylan's best -- "When you got nothin' you got nothin' to lose."
There are many people who think they got nothin' but a vote and don't see that stability and continuity are of great value to them. They may see their vote as a finger in the eye of those who "got somethin' "
And they don't understand that they don't really have "nothin' "; compared to about half of the world's population, the residents of the western liberal democracies benefit from huge investments (not just monetary) in order, stability, reduction of political and economic uncertainty, supply of the basics of civilization, etc. Part of the problem we have now is that many citizens really don't understand the benefits they gain from the common weal. They take such things for granted, until the deluge.
One reason why, for example Somalis, want to migrate to western europe is that they see the living difficulty of disorder, and the benefits of going to a place where there is some security. Maybe your average Cornishman needs to spend a month in Mog to see it.
Thomas Frank's new book: "What's the Matter With Cornwall?"
As in Kansas, it appears that voting against one's best interest is becoming a staple of right leaning populations, deciding to go along with fear mongers, haters, amoral oligarchs, and craven media overlords who have not the slightest concern for them outside of filching their votes to support their own agendas.
In contrast, left leaning voters rarely choose to have large bark and barbwire covered objects shoved up their asses just so can say they're taking back their country.
Whilst not wishing to defend those who made irrational decisions, many people believed the Leave rhetoric in the UK. My understanding of Cornwall, replicated elsewhere, is that some people who voted Leave believe(d) that the billions saved would go towards shoring up those who would lose EU subsidies. They are now asking for assurances, having belatedly realised that the politicians making those promises are not in positions to deliver. Farage isn't an MP. We will see whether Boris will be given the opportunity to put their money where his mouth is. Some people voted Leave when they wanted to Remain as a protest against Cameron, some as a protest against Tory economic policies, some out of ignorance of how the EU works, and some out of stupidity. I am a firm advocate for preferential voting as an outlet for people's protest (not in a referendum of course!), as it allows voters to signal to politicians they're dissatisfied, but remain on the side of sanity in government. Usually. The Leave vs Remain referendum was for many a prime example of the Lesser of two Evils, and a genuinely difficult decision for some voters, who sincerely believe that the ineptitude of EU bureaucracy, the selfish intransigence of some member countries, corruption in others, is intolerable and incurable. Some Bernie and trump supporters will find it genuinely difficult to cast a positive vote for HRC. And for similar reasons - a distaste for HRC, wishing to protest against Establishment policies, ignorance of the enormous reach of SCOTUS on their lives, and stupidity.