Walker Fumbles Away Georgia Senate Seat

Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA) must be sick and tired of campaigning. As he himself has observed, he's been on a Georgia ballot six times in under 2 years. Fortunately for him, there will now be rest for weary, as the Senator won a full term in his own right, defeating Republican Herschel Walker.

There was some scuttlebutt that the results might not be known until later in the week. However, the vote tallies were announced very rapidly, and the race was called for Warnock just a couple of hours after the polls closed. With 95%+ reporting, Warnock is up 2.6 points, 51.3% to 48.7%. In terms of raw totals, the Senator is up by about 90,000 votes. With that kind of gap, declaring a winner was an easy call for the AP and other media outlets. As we've noted multiple times, the last thing that Georgia will count is the mail-in ballots, of which there are expected to be roughly 200,000. There is no chance that a Republican will take three-quarters of the mail-in ballots, which almost invariably skew Democratic. And three-quarters is what Walker would need, so the running back is toast. He conceded defeat a little more than 3 hours after the polls closed.

Much ink has been spilled, and much ink will be spilled, on how lousy a candidate Walker was. And that is certainly true. You almost couldn't design a worse candidate if you tried (well, except for Roy Moore). That said, Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) won his runoff in 2021 by a margin of 50.6% to 49.4%, and Warnock won his runoff on that same day 51.0% to 49.0%. Maybe David Perdue, Kelly Loeffler and Walker were all lousy candidates, or maybe we are learning what the fundamentals of Georgia really are these days.

In any event, after being subject to nearly $400 million worth of advertising this cycle, the good people of Georgia will get a blissful respite from Senate campaigns for 4 years. As we noted yesterday, Gov. Brian Kemp (R-GA) is angling for a matchup against Ossoff in 2026, when the former is term-limited and the latter is up for reelection. Kemp is obviously someone who can win statewide, and he has a formidable campaign apparatus. So, if Ossoff vs. Kemp comes to pass, it could be a barnburner. On the other hand, the demographics that have been turning Georgia purple-blue will have had another 4 years to unfold, presumably pushing the state further in the Democrats' direction. In addition, Kemp figures to draw a challenge from the right, whereas Ossoff should have an easy primary. And, of course, incumbent senators win 90% of the time. So, Kemp probably shouldn't start scoping out Washington real estate quite yet.

And we would be remiss if we did not note that the result is another huge poke in the eye for Donald Trump. He spent the day on Tuesday fuming about his legal issues (see below), and explaining that when he said he wanted to get rid of the Constitution, he didn't mean that he wants to get rid of the Constitution. So, he hasn't yet responded to the fact that his handpicked candidate was rejected soundly by Georgia voters. Undoubtedly, he'll have something to say today, once he figures out exactly why this wasn't his fault. (Z)

Coming to You in January 2023: Biden 2024

Normally, if someone shares their "guess" that Joe Biden will announce his reelection bid shortly after the holidays, that is not really newsworthy. After all, you know what they say about the similarities between opinions and certain body parts. However, when the person sharing their "guess" is the White House Chief of Staff, that's worth taking notice of. And yesterday, Ron Klain was attending an event staged by The Wall Street Journal, and he sat for an interview with the paper. Asked about the President's reelection plans, Klain said that an announcement would be made sometime in January. He also added: "I expect the decision will be to do it."

There is absolutely no chance that a White House Chief of Staff would say these things off the cuff. He was certainly given permission to share this "guess," and was probably instructed to do so, so that the White House can see what the response is. There's no harm in having a little extra information to work with.

So, barring something unexpected. Biden will soon announce that he's running again. Note that this doesn't actually tell us all that much, though. The last time a president served one term and then did not stand for reelection was 142 years ago, so it is very likely the President will run again, octogenarian or not, announcement or not. And if he is running, it is best for both him and the Party to tamp down on any talk of primary challengers.

Meanwhile, if he doesn't end up running, Biden is still best served by telling everyone that he is. Otherwise, he gets to spend the second half of his term as a lame duck, which is not generally a good way to get things done. He can always change his mind later if politics or his health make that the right choice. Remember that, at this point in the cycle in 1950 and 1966, Harry S. Truman and Lyndon B. Johnson were plotting reelection bids that never actually happened. After all, as we've pointed out roughly 10,000 times, a week is a lifetime in politics, and between January 2023 and the 2024 presidential election, there will be just shy of 100 weeks. That's 11 cats' worth of lifetimes. (Z)

Trump Organization Goes 0-for-17

As we note above, Donald Trump had a really lousy day on Tuesday on the legal front, such that maybe he didn't have enough fury left to be angry about the Georgia U.S. Senate race. To start, the jury has reached its verdict for each of the 17 counts of criminal tax fraud that were charged against two Trump Organization companies. And it was a clean sweep; the company was found guilty on all 17.

Trump was not personally on trial, at least not yet. However, his company could end up paying $1.6 million in fines. Further, the convictions will forestall any contracts with the state or municipal governments, and may also make it hard to get loans from banks, assuming there is a bank out there still willing to do business with the Trumps. Further, this is clearly just the opening moves of the chess game. In his closing, prosecutor Joshua Steinglass insisted that the former president "explicitly sanctioned" the fraud and that "This whole narrative that Donald Trump is blissfully ignorant is just not true." The Donald is going to be on the hot seat next year, and the DA is clearly ready to go after him with both barrels.

Trump's lawyers said the verdicts were nonsense and that appeals are coming and yadda, yadda, yadda. Trump himself flipped his lid, and took to his social media platform to say exactly the things you would expect him to say in exactly the way you would expect him to say them: "It is a continuation of the Greatest Political Witch Hunt in the History of our Country. New York City is a hard place to be 'Trump,' as businesses and people flee our once Great City!" He also said that the prosecution was "unprecedented." Surely that's true, we are sure that New York City has never, ever gone after corporate tax cheats before. No, sir!

That's not the end of the bad news, either. After arguing about it for many months, the 1/6 Select Committee has decided it will indeed make criminal referrals, according to chair Bennie Thompson (D-MS). The Chair did not say exactly which people would be the subject of these referrals, but it would be something of a surprise if the former president wasn't on the list.

Of course, those criminal referrals are purely symbolic, and have no legal significance. They're just suggestions for what the Committee thinks special counsel Jack Smith ought to do. But maybe he doesn't need the "motivation.' He appears to have hit the ground running; yesterday, he sent grand jury subpoenas to election officials in Arizona, Michigan and Wisconsin. Those would be three of the states where Trump and his team fraudulently tried to replace the real electors with Trump electors. And what Smith wants is copies of any communications between those officials and the Trump campaign (and its allies).

What it amounts to is that the guy whose political career began with "Build the Wall" has now moved squarely into "the walls are closing in" territory. (Z)

Capitol Police Snub Republican Leaders

As long as we're on the subject of 1/6, several of the officers who protected the Capitol that day, as well as the family of Brian Sicknick (who died that day), were awarded the Congressional Gold Medal yesterday. And in the receiving line afterwards, clearly by pre-arrangement, the honorees refused to shake hands with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA). You can see it here:

We don't think we've ever seen McConnell, with his outstretched hand, look so awkward. And that's saying something.

If anyone knows the score, it's the Capitol police. And so they know that, first of all, McCarthy voted against impeaching Donald Trump and McConnell voted against conviction. McCarthy also voted to toss out some electoral votes, which means he was party to "stop the steal." Those two men might not be insurrectionists, but they are insurrectionist enablers. So, no wonder they were snubbed.

And in case anyone needed a reminder that the two leaders don't exactly have spines of steel, McConnell appeared on CNN on Tuesday and was asked if he would support a Trump presidential bid in 2024, should the sage of Mar-a-Lago claim the Republican presidential nomination for a third straight time. The Kentuckian's answer: "What I'm saying is, it would be pretty hard to be sworn into the presidency if you're not willing to uphold the Constitution. That's what I said and I just said it again."

The careful reader will notice that the word "no" does not appear in McConnell's answer, much less "Hell, no" or "No fu**ing way." Nor is there anything like: "I cannot support someone who calls for the Constitution to be put aside; after all, I swore an oath to uphold that document." The Minority Leader might look like a turtle, but he speaks like a weasel. And undoubtedly, if it had been McCarthy being interviewed, he would have been just as weaselly.

What it amounts to is that, once again, Trump has survived what should be a career-ending moment. And it barely took 48 hours before the most prominent Republicans in the country were kowtowing to him once again. McCarthy and McConnell have jobs for life if they want them; Trump isn't going to be able to stop them from being reelected. However, both men want to remain the leaders of their respective conferences. Trump commands the base, and the base commands many of the conference members, and so, ipso facto, Trump commands McCarthy and McConnell. That dynamic will end when Trump dies, and it might end if Trump is convicted of crimes, or if Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) seizes control of the Party. We have no doubt that the two minority leaders would be relieved to see any or all of these three things come to pass, but until then, they will keep puckering up. (Z)

McCarthy Has a Challenger...

As we've noted, Kevin McCarthy has never impressed us with his political skills. And of the four caucuses in Congress, his is far and away the most unruly. So, even if he's willing to kiss the ring (and anything else that needs to be kissed) in order to keep Donald Trump happy, it might not be enough. There has been much talk among the MAGA fanatics about denying McCarthy the speakership. You can't beat someone with nobody, of course, but the MAGA crew now has an actual candidate, as Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ) has put himself forward as a challenger.

You never know what the MAGA members are thinking, or if they are thinking at all. We can tell you, to a certainty, that Biggs is never, ever going to be elected as speaker. We assume that even he knows that. So, what's the goal here? Well, we can think of a few possibilities:

• It's For Show: The people who are electing the MAGA members to Congress pretty much hate anyone who is to the left of Genghis Khan. Such people are all filthy liberals and need to be destroyed, in their view. So, it could be that Biggs & Co. need to demonstrate that, if it was up to them, McCarthy would be tarred and feathered and ridden out of town on a rail.
  
  
• It's For Closure: The MAGA types, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) in particular, have never struck us as having much control of their emotions. Undoubtedly, they are disappointed in the midterm results. They can't blame the main culprits for that, namely themselves and their Dear Leader. So, perhaps this is just venting; the Congressional version of a temper tantrum.
  
  
• It's For a Non-McCarthy Speaker: While it's not going to be Biggs, the MAGA members might have persuaded themselves that if they can frustrate McCarthy's aspirations, they might get someone more right-wing than he is. Which is really saying something, because the Minority Leader is very right-wing.
  
  
• It's For Leverage: This seems the likeliest possibility. McCarthy would give just about anything to be Speaker. Not his spine or his testicles, of course, since he doesn't have those things. But plum committee assignments? Definitely. An agreement to launch 20 investigations into Hunter Biden's laptop, as opposed to just 10? Certainly. Prime office space in the Rayburn office building? No problem. Needless to say, the bigger the threat seems to be, the more concessions that might be extracted.

The Speaker elections will take place in early January, and so we're not likely to find out exactly what's going on until then. Although, as long as we're on this subject, we get a lot of questions about this situation. And though we've answered the big ones a couple of times each, it's probably useful to review. So, here are few notes to keep in mind:

• McCarthy remains the favorite to become speaker. He's much closer to the promised land than anyone else is. Even if he can't herd the MAGA members, and they hold firm after dozens (or hundreds) of votes, he's not necessarily dead in the water. It is unlikely that House Democrats would be willing to vote for him directly. However, the House can vote to change the rules, and to choose a speaker based on a plurality of votes cast, rather than an outright majority. It's been done twice before, and it could be done again. In exchange for certain concessions (which may or may not be made public), the Democrats might vote to suspend the normal rules, which would resolve the situation without putting them in the position of supporting McCarthy directly.
  
  
• If it's not McCarthy, then the next likeliest possibility is a moderate Republican, backed by a coalition of Republicans and Democrats. If this did come to pass, then our guess is that the person would come from the Problem Solvers Caucus, which literally exists to promote bipartisan cooperation. There are roughly two dozen Republicans who are members of the Caucus.
  
  
• It is not likely to be someone to the right of McCarthy. The other Republicans don't want the headache of 2 years' worth of leadership from a potential loose cannon. Nor do they want to start the next 2 years by catering to the demands of the MAGA crew. That would set a... problematic precedent.
  
  
• There is zero chance that it will be Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY). The Democrats might go for that, although maybe not the progressives, since Cheney is still a conservative Republican. And the Republicans would never go for it; she's just too toxic for many Republican voters.
  
  
• There is less than zero chance that it will be Donald Trump. The majority of House Republicans won't say it openly, but they would be thrilled to be rid of Trump. So, they are certainly not going to hand him one of the two or three biggest platforms the U.S. system of government has to offer. And that's before we consider the fact that they don't want to spend every day answering reporters' questions about the latest outlandish thing Trump said/did.

Anyhow, politics watchers have about a month to ponder the situation, and to stock up on popcorn. (Z)

...And So Does Ronna Romney McDaniel, Apparently

RNC Chair Ronna Romney McDaniel has had a pretty lousy tenure, with three straight "bad" elections for the Party. Consequently, as she runs for reelection to the post, she's vulnerable to a challenger, if a viable one should present themselves. We don't believe the MyPillow guy is that person; if he's the best the opposition comes up with, then McDaniel should be safe. However, it now looks like she's going to draw a more serious challenger in the person of RNC committeewoman Harmeet Dhillon. Reportedly, an announcement is imminent.

Dhillon has a few things going for her that Mike Lindell does not. She's a woman, first of all, and as we've written, we believe that there are some RNC members who think that makes the party more marketable to those all-important suburban women. She has experience in party leadership, whereas Lindell does not. She's also not a half-step away from being sent to a place with padded walls and no sharp instruments in the cafeteria.

That said, while Dhillon is slightly more sane than Lindell, she's not that much more sane. Not only is she very close with Donald Trump, having represented him in court, she's also a "stop the steal" believer who has questioned the 2020 election results. Dhillon also embraces conspiratorial thinking, and helped propagate more than one nutty theory related to the "truth" about the attack on Paul Pelosi.

McDaniel has done the high-wire act for the last 6 years, managing to keep the Trump faction of the Party basically happy and the non-Trump faction basically happy. It is improbable the Dhillon would be capable of doing the same, or that she would want to. No, she'd be all in on the MAGA stuff and on Trump. We operate on the twin assumptions that: (1) the members of the RNC care about winning elections, and (2) the members of the RNC recognize that hugging Trump closer is not the way to do that. So, we assume they will not be interested in what Dhillon is selling. However, when only 168 people are voting, and they are pretty well ensconced in a red bubble, you just never know. (Z)

The Word Cup, Part V: Reactionary Slogans

This would ideally have run yesterday, but December is the most intense phase of the teaching calendar (well, December and May-June). so, it runs today. Here are the previous entries:

• The Word Cup, Part I: The Martial Spirit
• The Word Cup, Part II: Presidential Campaigns, Pre-Civil War
• The Word Cup, Part III: Reform
• The Word Cup, Part IV: Presidential Campaigns, from the Civil War to World War II

The last group of non-presidential slogans focused on movements that were progressive in their nature. However, American culture and politics have always had a regressive/reactionary element, too. And today, we take a look at the rallying cries of some of those groups of people:

The Chinese Must Go! (1850s): The California gold rush began in 1849. Chinese immigrants, looking to make their fortune, began to arrive in large numbers in 1850s. Anti-Chinese bigotry reared its ugly head... well, pretty much the day after the Chinese began to arrive. The notion was that the new arrivals were taking gold that "belonged" to the white man. Hence the slogan "The Chinese Must Go."

Of course, the gold rush eventually came to an end. But the anti-Chinese sentiment most certainly did not. Indeed, "The Chinese Must Go" reached the peak of its influence in the 1870s thanks to the rabid xenophobe Denis Kearney. Kearney was a moderately successful businessman who decided to transition into politics, and who decided the key to power was telling working-class white men that immigrants were to blame for all of their problems. Obviously, the Kearney playbook couldn't possibly work today. At very least, someone like that couldn't be elected president. Right?

There had been anti-immigrant political movements before Kearney and his followers came along, but this was arguably the first of those movements to achieve lasting success. After a white, working-class-led riot in San Francisco in 1877, the anti-Chinese forces were able to compel the state of California to ban Chinese immigration in 1879, and then were able to successfully lobby the federal government to follow suit in 1882, with the Chinese Exclusion Act. Chinese people could not again immigrate to the U.S., at least not legally, until the 1940s.

Kill the Indian, Save the Man (1902): This is not about literal killings. The U.S. government did plenty of that when it came to the Native Americans, of course, but didn't really have a slogan for it. There was Phil Sheridan's line that "the only good Indian is a dead Indian," but that was more a statement of mid-19th century U.S. Army policy than it was a slogan.

The "killing" in "Kill the Indian, Save the Man" referred to Native American culture. Brig. Gen. Richard Henry Pratt was the long-serving superintendent of the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania (perhaps best known as the alma mater of super-athlete Jim Thorpe). And by the standards of his day, Pratt was actually a liberal. In fact, he was basically Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) liberal. In 1902, at a time when segregation was both the custom and the law of the land, Pratt lambasted racial bigotry and wrote: "Association of races and classes is necessary to destroy racism and classism." Interestingly, this is the first known use of the word "racism."

The problem, from a modern vantage point, is Pratt's belief that to overcome racism, it was essential to erase races. Well, non-white races, at least. And so, in service of equality as he understood it, he proposed to transform his Native American students into white men and to eliminate all vestiges of tribal identity and culture. Today, of course, that is called cultural genocide. It is difficult to quantify exactly how much harm was done to Pratt's charges, who were often forcibly taken from their parents. But it was surely substantial.

Better Dead than Red (1930): There were two major "red scares" in U.S. history. The first came during and after World War I, largely in response to the Russian Revolution. That got the ball rolling on rabid anticommunism. And it was in response to that rabid anticommunism that The Nation's editorial board published a sarcastic piece that concluded this sentence: "As for those weaklings who may fall by the wayside and starve to death, let the country bury them under the epitaph: Better Dead than Red."

Again, that was meant ironically (which is clear from the original editorial; you can read it here, if you wish). However, when the second red scare began after World War II, Joseph McCarthy and other anti-communist zealots appropriated the phrase and began to use it unironically.

The slogan, and the underlying sentiment that propelled it to prominence in the 1950s, helped fuel the belief that it was worthwhile to fight two wars (Korea and Vietnam) to "resist" communism. And those wars did much harm to the U.S., not to mention those two nations and the rest of the world.

Segregation Now, Segregation Tomorrow, Segregation Forever (1963): This might be the most famous slogan of the four in this set. Alabama governor George Wallace may have been a bigot, but he knew how to turn a phrase. And this phrase from his inaugural address was quickly seized upon by anti-Civil Rights Movement Southerners.

Undoubtedly, the slogan affected the thinking of white Southerners and inspired their continued resistance to integration. That includes violent resistance; it's fair to suspect that some of the killings that took place after 1963, from the Freedom Summer murders to the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., were at least partly fueled by Wallace's fiery words. That said, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed a little over a year after Wallace coined this phrase, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was passed a little over 2 years after. Further, when federal troops showed up to integrate the University of Alabama, Wallace uttered his little catchphrase and then... got the hell out of the way. So, the impact of this particular slogan is nebulous.

Recall that the standard of judgment here is impact, not necessarily positive impact. In any event, the ballot is here. The next set of slogans will cover presidential campaigns from World War II to the end of the 20th century. (Z)

A December to Rhymember, Part IV: Walker, Texas Resident

With apologies to Richard Nixon, it occurs to us that we won't have Herschel Walker to kick around anymore. Or maybe it would be more apropos to say "punt around anymore." In any case, we figure we better run some of the Walker-inspired verse we got before it passes its expiration date (which is pretty much... today). Leading off is K.F. in Framingham, MA:

There once was a candidate Herschel
Seen in many a political commercial
The truth about Mr Walker
He's not a very good talker
And more than a little controversial

And a "back to basics" entry from D.L. in Oaxaca de Juárez, Mexico:

Roses are red.
Violets are blue.
Does Walker's head rattle?
I think it do.

Completing the hat trick is C.P. in Perry, ME:

There once was a guy called Tuberville.
Herschel Walker's candidacy gave him a thrill.
He said with a grin,
"If Herschel does win,
I'll be the second dumbest on the Hill."

Here is the e-mail address for submissions; we'll have more verse tomorrow, on... who knows what theme? (Z)

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