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Cheney Says There Is No Battle Inside the Select Committee
Yesterday, The New York Times reported that the members of the Jan. 6 Select Committee are at odds with one another over whether to ask the Dept. of Justice to indict Donald Trump for conspiring to defraud the United States by interfering with the counting of the electoral votes. According to the report, some members believe that if the Committee concludes that Trump broke the law, then it should say so. Others say that such a recommendation has no legal meaning at all, and AG Merrick Garland will make his own call, no matter what the Committee does. Asking for an indictment will just make it look political and will make a potential future conviction seem illegitimate to many people.
Later in the day, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY), appeared on CNN's State of the Union and denied that there was any dispute among the members about what to do. She did say, however, that the panel has concluded that Trump did commit a crime and that the Committee is simply having a discussion about what to do next. Her exact words: "The committee is working in a really collaborative way to discuss these issues, as we are with all of the issues we're addressing, and we'll continue to work together to do so. So I wouldn't characterize there as being a dispute on the committee."
Maybe it is just a matter of a definition, but clearly the Committee has not yet decided what to do with the finding that Trump broke the law. One approach is to just issue a multi-thousand-page report, full of documentation, and let Garland do what he wants with it. The other is to send the AG a copy along with a note saying: "Please indict Donald Trump." In reality, Garland is going to make his own decision and doesn't need any advice from the Committee. Stronger yet, he surely does not want any, since he doesn't want to make any indictment look political and a Post-It note attached to the report saying: "Please indict Donald Trump" most definitely makes it look political.
Cheney also noted that the Committee is functioning very well, in a bipartisan way, and she expects it to come to agreement on all matters after discussing them thoroughly. (V)
Republicans Promise to Rein in Biden If They Capture Congress
Top Senate Republicans, including Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and Minority Whip John Thune (R-SD), have said that if the Republicans capture Congress in November, all of Joe Biden's leftist plans are dead and he will have to become a moderate to get anything done. McConnell spoke to Dana Perino on "Fox News Sunday" and said that if he becomes majority leader, he would be focused on crime, education, and defense, and would hope to work with Biden on these issues. He also said that if Republicans take Congress, he will make sure that Biden becomes a moderate.
Thune told The Hill that energy and big tech are areas of potential common interest that the GOP could work with Biden on. But he didn't spell out the details. What he really meant is that if Biden would work with the Republicans to pass a law preventing social media from blocking Donald Trump when he posts outright lies, he can count on Republican votes. As to energy, what he meant is that if Biden were to agree to greatly increase the amount of coal, oil, and natural gas produced in the U.S., he could count on Republican support. It is quite unlikely Biden would agree to either of these things.
It is surely news to the progressive wing of the Democratic Party that Biden is a leftist. And even if and when Biden does agree with the Republicans on something, it seems unlikely that will result in legislation, or even funding. For example, McConnell mentioned crime as a top issue. Suppose Biden wanted to deflect "soft on crime" attacks in 2024, so he proposed billions of extra funding for better training for police, more officers on the beat, and other pro-police things. Would the Republicans agree? The last thing they want is for Biden (or any Democrat) to be able to say in 2024: "We provided a huge amount of extra funding for the police." That would destroy the Republicans' message: "Democrats want to defund the police."
So just because the Republicans say they want something doesn't mean they would agree to it if it were offered. Of course, if Biden were to make a nationally televised speech entirely devoted to more funding for the police and some Senate Democrat introduced a bill to achieve it, then McConnell would be on the hot seat if he refused to bring it up for debate. But he'll worry about that problem if and when it occurs. The bottom line is that if the Republicans recapture one or both houses of Congress, Biden is going to have to get much more comfortable using the bully pulpit to put the Republicans on the spot, something the President has thus far been pretty leery of doing. (V)
Democrats Try to Appeal to Ukrainian-American Voters
Ukrainian Americans aren't a large part of the electorate, but they are concentrated in some swing states, especially Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Florida. Democrats have noticed and are trying to portray Republicans as "weak on Russia." They are starting to run ads to that effect. Expect the remark from Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC), that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is a "thug," to be prominently featured in them. While they are at it, why not also mention that Donald Trump called Vladimir Putin a "savvy genius"? And then there is the observation from Ohio Senate candidate J.D. Vance (R) that he doesn't care what happens to Ukraine one way or another. Other Republicans have said similar things. Making an ad quoting all of them and then asking why the Republican Party is so pro-Putin shouldn't be that hard.
A major Democratic super PAC, American Bridge, has already rolled out a five-figure print ad campaign, with part of each ad in Ukrainian. It is also running an ad in Cleveland, Detroit, and Philadelphia attacking various Republicans for being pro-Russia. Sooner or later, everything becomes political in America. (V)
Putin May Interfere in 2024 Elections
Russian President Vladimir Putin has steadfastly denied that he interfered with the 2016 presidential election, despite considerable evidence that he did. However, 2024 may be a different story. We're not suggesting he won't interfere. We're suggesting that he will, just that he won't deny it next time. In fact, he has basically announced in advance that he is going to, on account of the U.S. helping to thwart his little pet project of turning Ukraine into a vassal state.
Putin didn't give the details and we don't have a staff astrologer, at least not since the last one was arrested for insider trading, so we are going to have to make a wild guess here: He will help Donald Trump or any Trumpish Republican who gets the GOP nomination. The method is clear, however: Putin will spread disinformation on social media. He might also get the FSB or GRU to hack Democrats' computers and Democratic websites and release the information to friendly journalists or politicians, possibly with some outright lies mixed in to make it more interesting.
U.S. intelligence is aware of this possibility and is taking some steps to deal with it already. DNI Avril Haines recently appointed CIA officer Jeffrey Wichman to a position within the intelligence community to lead a group focused on foreign interference in U.S. elections, including not only threats from Russia, but also from China, and other adversaries.
Of course, there is only so much Wichman's group can do alone. If it determines that some posters on Facebook or Twitter are in fact working out of the Russian troll farm in St. Petersburg, they have no way of taking them down. All they can do is report their findings to the company that runs the site. If the company decides to keep all the postings up because many readers "like" them, it is not clear what the government can do other than make its own counter postings. Of course, one other tactic is to try to hack the posters and destroy their infrastructure, but something like that would surely need Joe Biden's express approval since it could lead to a cyberwar.
If Biden is the Democratic candidate, one thing he could do that would not lead to war is to add a note to each of his speeches that he is in constant contact with the DNI and knows that many of the postings on social media come from the Russians, so people should be very careful about believing what they read there. If enough people are forewarned that there is a lot of Russian propaganda on social media, they may be more careful before swallowing it. However, the people who are the targets of this propaganda probably don't watch Biden's speeches, so he will have to find other ways to get the word out. In any event, it is a virtual certainty that a very angry Vladimir Putin is going to try to influence the 2024 elections. But it is far from certain that he will get away with it now that the DNI and CIA are on to him. (V)
Is a Coup against Putin Possible?
Probably every night before he goes to bed, Joe Biden prays that either the FSB or Russian military or both decide to depose Vladimir Putin and then make it happen. Putin, of course, is keenly aware that some folks high up in the Russian government might get this idea and tries to keep his distance from everyone, even his most trusted generals.
Notice the cameras in the photo above. They are not because Putin wants to broadcast the meeting with his generals to show the Russian people how hard he is working for them. The feeds probably go to two different agencies so that if someone Putin is meeting with managed to smuggle a weapon into the room and started to use it, help would be on the way in seconds.
Nevertheless, it is legitimate to ask: How likely is a coup? Amy Knight, who has written six books on Russian history and politics, including one entitled: Orders to Kill: The Putin Regime and Political Murder, has written an op-ed in The Washington Post about precisely that question based on her knowledge of Russian history.
She starts by pointing out that there have been two successful coups since the Bolsheviks took over in 1917. The first one was in June 1953, when the dreaded chief of Stalin's secret police, Lavrentiy Beria, was deposed. Stalin himself died in March 1953, but Beria still had an iron grip on power. Fortunately for the plotters, Defense Minister Nikolai Bulganin and Marshal Georgy Zhukov hated Beria and were able to arrest the unsuspecting Beria at a leadership meeting. Beria was tried for treason, convicted, and then shot. The coup was risky because Beria had many supporters high up in government and they understood that they were next, but the plotters bought them off with promises of promotions (and maybe dachas and rubles). In any event, it worked.
An even more daring coup was the ouster of Nikita Khrushchev in 1964. The plotters this time were Leonid Brezhnev, Aleksei Kosygin, and Mikhail Suslov. They made sure the KGB and top military leaders were with them. Brezhnev was so nervous that word would leak out that he had a personal guard armed with a machine gun stay outside his door when he slept for several nights before the coup.
The actual transfer of power was peaceful—in a sense. When Khrushchev flew back to Moscow from a lovely vacation at a resort on the Black Sea, the head of the KGB, Vladimir Semichastny—who was a Khrushchev appointee—met him at the airport along with a squad of KGB guards to inform him that his services were no longer required and not to resist. He didn't. He was taken to the Kremlin, where Brezhnev reiterated that his time had come. In a narrow technical sense, it wasn't a coup since he was removed by the Central Committee of the Communist Party, which had the power to demote him from First Secretary to Last Secretary. While the military supported the change, Khrushchev wasn't deposed by some Lt. Colonel and his band of merry men waving machine guns.
Unlike Beria, Khrushchev was not shot. He was given a dacha, a car, and a pension of 500 rubles a month (about $4,800 a month in modern dollars). One of his grandsons was once asked what Khrushchev did in retirement and he said: "grandfather cries." Khrushchev lived another 7 years and with great difficulty managed to write a memoir and have it snuck out of Russia for publication, despite the KGB watching his every move.
Any attempt to depose Putin would require either active or passive support from the FSB, the National Guard, and the military. Putin has allies at the top of all three organizations, but so did Khrushchev. The FSB chief, Aleksandr Bortnikov, is Putin's old friend from his St. Petersburg KGB days.
The head of the National Guard, Viktor Zolotov, has known Putin from the early 1990s. From 2000 to 2013, Zolotov was head of the Russian version of the Secret Service. When Putin created the National Guard in 2016, he personally put Zolotov in charge because he trusted him so much. Putin also transferred 340,000 troops to Zolotov in order to keep both the proletariat and the elite in line.
The head of the military is Sergei Shoigu, who never served in the military but who is a close personal friend of Putin. They have vacationed together in Shoigu's native Siberia. Shoigu may be the weakest link in the troika, though, since Putin is furious with how badly the military has fared in Ukraine, and if a scapegoat is needed, it is going to be Shoigu, not Bortnikov or Zolotov. Shoigu may realize that unless things turn around pretty fast in Ukraine, it is going to be either his head or Putin's on the chopping block, and he might have a preference there. We don't know.
The fates of Beria and Khrushchev show that when there is a crisis, loyalties can shift quickly. It probably wouldn't take much to get Shoigu to jump ship if he were convinced the other two were with him. Bortnikov was appointed by Putin, but Semichastny was appointed by Khrushchev and eventually decided his patron had to go. If the war in Ukraine continues to go badly, Bortnikov could see which way the wind is blowing and jump ship as well. What would Zolotov do if the other two came to him and said: Putin dolzhen uyti. We don't know and probably Zolotov doesn't either at this point. A lot hinges on what happens in Ukraine in the coming weeks and months. (V)
Trump Endorses the Quacker of Oz
Mitch McConnell is probably tearing his distinguished gray hair out, thanks to Donald Trump. The former president has now endorsed Mehmet Oz, a television quack who doesn't live in Pennsylvania, for the GOP Senate nomination in that state. McConnell very strongly prefers David McCormick, a hedge fund manager who also doesn't live in Pennsylvania, but who is more mainstream. For Democrats, this is a win-win situation. If Oz manages to beat McCormick, then the Republicans get a very weak candidate for the seat of retiring Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA). If McCormick beats Oz in the primary, it is another black eye for Trump and shows that his endorsements aren't worth much.
Oz has a B.A. from Harvard, an M.D. from Penn and an M.B.A. from the Wharton School. Initially, he was a fine doctor and heart surgeon. But in 2009 he appeared on Oprah Winfrey's show and later got his own show dispensing medical advice. Some of this advice is summarized below:
- Hydroxychloroquine can cure COVID-19.
- Most countries require genetically modified food to be labeled as such.
- Astrological signs can tell you a lot about your health.
- Umckaloabo root extract relieves symptoms of the common cold.
- Lavender soap cures leg cramps.
- A mixture of strawberries and baking soda can whiten teeth.
- Raspberry ketones are a miracle way to burn off fat.
- Green coffee extract is also a magic way to burn off fat.
Sounds great. Only problem is that all of it is false. Cue the sound of ducks conversing. Oz, incidentally, is surely aware that it's all nonsense, which is why he generally frames this sort of thing as "just asking questions." However, his audience doesn't want hard science, it wants easy answers to difficult and/or unsolved medical problems. If you don't give the audience what it wants, then your show isn't going to last. This raises the question: Who is worse, an unhinged person who peddles quackery because he really doesn't know any better, or a perfectly hinged person who peddles quackery because that's where the money is? We don't know the answer to that, but we do know that the great majority of quacks (with or without an M.D.) are in the second category, including Oz, Alex Jones, Elizabeth Holmes, and nearly everyone involved with the "vaccines cause autism" movement.
This endorsement is Trump's second whack at the Pennsylvania senatorial piñata. He previously endorsed Sean Parnell, who ended his run after a judge supported Parnell's wife's claims that he had threatened her and their children. During the speech in which Trump endorsed Oz, the former president said: "You know, when you're in television for 18 years, that's like a poll, that means people like you." Actually, being on television isn't at all like a poll. In a poll, the pollster asks a randomly selected bunch of about 1,000 people if they like someone or if they prefer that person to someone else. Dispensing false medical information to rubes who don't know better isn't at all like a poll.
Democrats are probably going to lie low on Oz until after the primary. They want him to get the nomination because he is so nutty and there are so many recordings of him spouting nonsense on his show. McCormick could campaign as an outsider and successful businessman. The biggest strike against him is that he lives in Connecticut and his connection to Pennsylvania was long ago.
Besides, the Democrats are busy with their own primary. It features Lt. Gov. John Fetterman (D-PA), who is leading in the polls, Rep. Conor Lamb (D-PA), state Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta (D), and a handful of other minor players. Fetterman and Lamb are white and Kenyatta is Black. Probably either Fetterman or Lamb could win the general election, albeit with very different coalitions. Fetterman would get lots of progressives who are marginal voters to the polls and also quite a few blue-collar Republicans due to his very working-class background and style. Lamb is more of an elite candidate (his grandfather was once majority leader of the state Senate). He would attract plenty of moderate, affluent, suburban Republicans as he is not the slightest bit scary (translation: He's not 6'6" and does not look like he could be chief of security at a Slayer concert). Kenyatta just doesn't have enough of a base and Pennsylvania doesn't have enough Black voters (12%) to make him viable, the way Black candidates are viable in places like Georgia and North Carolina. (V)
Judge Likely to Allow Challenge to Greene to Proceed
The 14th Amendment states that people who have supported an insurrection against the United States shall not be elected to federal or state office. A group of Georgia voters have filed a federal lawsuit claiming that Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) participated in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection and should therefore be disqualified from running for reelection. On Friday, federal judge Amy Totenberg indicated that she is unlikely to toss the case out and would prefer that it go to trial. She is expected to make a formal ruling today.
Greene's lawyer, James Bopp, who is famous in conservative circles for taking on this kind of case, said that his client is not an insurrectionist. However, the plaintiffs introduced a video in which Greene said she opposed the peaceful transfer of power to Joe Biden because he didn't win.
Another issue here is the 1872 Amnesty Act, which cleared over 150,000 Confederate troops of being part of an insurrection, and thus qualifying them for holding future office. Some legal scholars believe that the Act applies only to insurrections committed before it was passed, not future insurrections. During the hearing Friday, the judge said: "I don't think that the Amnesty Act likely was prospective." If she sticks to that, the Act will not be a defense and she could well rule that a trial is needed to determine if Greene was an insurrectionist and if so, whether the 14th Amendment does indeed bar her from seeking office.
A similar issue came up in North Carolina when a group of voters sued to block Madison Cawthorn from seeking reelection. However, North Carolina law states that the plaintiffs must live in the district where the politician is running. When Cawthorn saw the new map, he switched districts, so the plaintiffs were no longer his constituents. The judge then said he was required to throw the suit out.
In any case, this is going to come up many times until a court weighs in (or, more likely, several levels of the court system weigh in), so there is much justification for allowing the case to proceed. And Greene is as good a test case as any, for several reasons. (V)
Meet the New Murdoch, Same as the Old Murdoch
When Fox News' boss Rupert Murdoch announced years ago that his kids were going to take over the family business, people wondered which kid would dominate and whether Fox would change as a result. Murdoch has six children, but only two, James and Lachlan, were ever in the running to become CEO of News Corp. James was thought to be something of a moderate, while Lachlan was more conservative, but perhaps not as much as his father. And it wasn't clear which one would get dad's nod. In fact, in 2005, Lachlan had a bit of a falling out with his father and fled New York for Australia.
However, James Murdoch has found other things to do, so it looks like Lachlan will take over when the time comes. And in a speech in Sydney last week, Lachlan made it abundantly clear that he stands with Tucker Carlson and the rest of the Fox News' opinion team. He took a swipe at the "elites" who disdain "traditional values" (see next item). He also opposed vaccine mandates, business shutdowns to control the pandemic, and The New York Times' 1619 project about the origins of slavery in America. He is also against the media "conspiracy" that has suppressed coverage of Hunter Biden's laptop. Sounds like the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree.
Lachlan also echoed other culture-war battles, including those centered on education. In addition, he recently attended a party celebrating William Barr's new book. In the book, Barr praised Trump's agenda, but faulted him for not accepting the election results. Barr has his disagreements with Trump, but said he would vote for him in 2024 if he runs. Lachlan's appearance at the party suggests that he is more-or-less on the same page as Barr, even though he was never as close to Trump as his father is.
In any event, it is now clear that when Rupert Murdoch ends his involvement with News Corp., whether that is because he decides to retire or because he's kicked his oxygen habit, Lachlan will step into his shoes and keep marching in the same direction as his old man. People who were expecting a change when the next generation took over will be disappointed.
However, one thing that Murdoch the younger will have to deal with sooner or later is the demographic makeup of his audience. The median age of CNN viewers is 61, of MSNBC viewers is 63, and of Fox viewers is 69. That means half of Fox' audience is in their 70s, 80s, and 90s. This is not an audience that most advertisers want. Furthermore, even if an 85-year-old is a devoted Fox viewer and will never change, there is no guarantee that he or she will still be watching in 10 years. This is something that can't be cured by putting younger talent on the air. After all, Tucker Carlson is only 52, but he still doesn't attract a lot of young viewers. Maybe simple economics will ultimately force Murdoch's hand and make him change the product in order to survive. Remember, American media history is replete with examples of media entities—The New York Herald, The New York World, MovieTone News, Your Hit Parade, Reader's Digest, the CBS Evening News, Life magazine, MTV, MySpace, etc., that were king of the hill, right up until they were yesterday's news. (V)
The Culture Wars Have Gone Global
David Brooks, The New York Times' star conservative columnist, has an interesting piece on one of America's most successful exports: the culture wars. It starts out by noting that his generation (he is 60) truly believed what Francis Fukuyama wrote in his book The End of History and the Last Man (although Brooks doesn't specifically cite Fukuyama). What both of them believed is that the battle between liberal democracy and autocracy was over and democracy won. Before long, the whole world would be Sweden.
The idea is that as countries develop, they become intertwined with the West and more like it. In other words, globalization would lead to more democracy. Now it looks like another beautiful theory mugged by a brutal gang of facts. Russia, China, India, Turkey, Hungary, Poland, and a bunch of smaller countries are going the autocracy route. The U.K., while very much a democracy, said "no" to globalism when it brexited from the European Union. In the U.S., Donald Trump very much wanted to wall off the outside world, both figuratively and literally, and will probably withdraw from NATO if he gets the chance in 2025. The same trend against globalization and in favor of nationalism is also present in many smaller nations.
The idea behind globalization is that every country should make the products it is best at producing, and this would lead to the best and cheapest products for everyone. If China can make iPhones cheaper than America, then China should make iPhones. What the whole globalization movement missed is that economics isn't everything. Great numbers of people feel looked down upon and that is more important to them than getting cheap products. That is true in America, India, England, France, Turkey, and elsewhere, and leaders who understand and exploit this get traction.
A key issue is that Western values are not everyone's cup of tea. In his book The WEIRDest People in the World, Joseph Henrich does an analysis of Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich Democracies (i.e., WEIRD countries). He writes that the Western world values people who are self-obsessed, control-oriented, nonconformist, and analytical. Not only do Trump supporters not agree with this, but neither do millions of people in India, Turkey, and other countries where populists have won free elections by large majorities. To these people, the idea that each person is free to choose his or her own identity seems ridiculous. The idea that the purpose of education is to give students critical thinking skills so they can reject what they learned from their parents seems foolish. And we're not even going to begin on what people in many countries think of the idea that you can decide what gender you are or have no gender at all. Globalization and Western values are being increasingly rejected around the world. The same battles being fought in U.S. politics are now being fought in the politics of many other countries.
Brooks' take on all this is that it is a battle between personal autonomy and community cohesion. In simple terms, Democrats in urban centers say: "If you want to do X and it is legal, you can do X and it is OK." Republicans in rural areas (and increasingly people in rural areas in other countries) say: "Too bad you want to do X, but our community and tradition reject X so no, you can't do X." So maybe the next world war isn't countries A, B, and C against countries X, Y, and Z, but Western-oriented people against tradition-oriented people within the same country. In any event, it looks like Fukuyama got it completely wrong. (V)
In France, It Will Be Macron vs. Le Pen again
In France, elections are held on Sundays rather than Tuesdays, so more people can vote. What a strange idea. Yesterday, French President Emmanuel Macron got roughly 28% of the vote, according to projections, and his nearest challenger, Marine Le Pen, got 23%. They will face off on April 24 in a runoff, just as they did in 2017. It's déjà vu all over again.
Does this foreshadow a race between Joe Biden and Donald Trump in 2024? The circumstances are similar. A center-left candidate beat a far-right candidate last time and now they will be at it again. Of course, what happens in France is not necessarily a predictor of what will happen in America in 2 years, but the same forces are at play. In both cases, one party has a rules-based, somewhat bland candidate running against a fiery far-right populist who wants to throw the rules overboard and rule as a fascist dictator.
In 2017, Macron crushed Le Pen by 30 points. Polls now show that he would likely win the runoff by only 4-6 points. In France, as in the U.S., inflation is a big issue and Macron is getting the blame for it. However, unlike Trump, Le Pen has never claimed she won in 2017 and the election was stolen from her. She is also trying to moderate her image by emphasizing that she has six cats and how much she loves her furry friends.
A Le Pen win in 2 weeks would upend politics in Europe and mark the first far-right presidency in French history. (Note that there have been some far-right leaders in France before, but they weren't presidents. Yes, we're looking at you, Charles Martel.) Macron is a tremendous supporter of the E.U. and Le Pen is an opponent of it. If she wins, we could have Frexit, which would be a huge hit to the organization.
Unlike most European countries where the senior executive office is a prime minister who can command a majority in parliament, in France the president has more power than the prime minister; the president is not chosen by the parliament and cannot be removed by a simple majority vote of no confidence. Whoever wins in 2 weeks will be president for 5 full years unless he or she resigns or dies or—guess what—is impeached and convicted by a two-thirds majority. The procedure is different from that of the U.S. in some key ways, though. For one, in France the "jury" is a combined sitting of the National Assembly and Senate (925 members in all). For another, the vote is by secret ballot. Many Republicans believe that if the votes on Donald Trump's impeachment were secret, he would have been convicted. (V)
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