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Animal House

That headline seems as good as any to describe the current state of the U.S. House of Representatives, even if the cocaine sex parties apparently ended when Madison Cawthorn left town. There was much information coming out of the south wing of the Capitol yesterday. Here's a rundown of the eight storylines that stood out to us:

  1. The Clock Is Ticking: The House Republican Conference held the candidates forum that was promised, with Reps. Steve Scalise (R-LA) and Jim Jordan (R-OH) making their respective pitches. Today at 10:00 a.m. ET, there will be an internal vote among Republicans—the results are supposed to remain secret, but that seems unlikely.

    There is little clarity as to how close either of the candidates is to the promised land. The most optimistic projection we could find comes from Rep. Mike Garcia (R-CA), who thinks it is 50/50 that a new speaker will be elected today. The least optimistic projection we could find comes from Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), who thinks there is about a 2% chance a new speaker will be elected today. That's quite a broad spread, but since most Republican members are actively tempering expectations, it's likely Massie is more correct than Garcia is.

  2. Meanwhile, at the Grown-Ups Table: The Democrats also held a candidates forum. It lasted considerably less than an hour, and ended with Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) being chosen unanimously as the Democratic candidate for speaker. He won't be elected, of course—no Republicans would vote for a Democrat and, truth be told, we also suspect there are at least a handful of them who would not vote for a Black man (ahem, Paul Gosar).

  3. McCarthyism: After saying he was open to resuming the speakership on Monday, Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) said yesterday that he did not want to be nominated for the job by his colleagues. That's at least a little different from "I don't want the job, end of sentence." What the purpose of this maneuvering is, we do not know, but there are apparently McCarthy loyalists who want to drag this out, either to give their candidate a chance to return, or to punish those who pushed him out, or both.

  4. "A" Is for "A**h..." Er, Something: Until fairly recently, Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) had a reputation as a moderate and as one of the more level-headed members of the Republican Conference. Maybe whatever Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) has is contagious, because Mace first sided with the far-right members to boot McCarthy, and then she turned the "look at me" stunt dial up to 10. Yesterday, she showed up to work with a shirt bearing a large, red "A" on it, as Mace claims she's being "persecuted" for her vote to remove McCarthy.

  5. Ghosts of Jordan's Past: As we have noted many times, Jordan was at the center of a serial molestation scandal when he was a wrestling coach at Ohio State. He insists he didn't see anything; very few people who were a part of the program are buying that. Yesterday, four of the wrestlers who were victimized spoke up to warn Americans what they might be getting. "Do you really want a guy in that job who chose not to stand up for his guys?" said one former OSU wrestler. "Is that the kind of character trait you want for a House speaker?" If Jordan does get the gig, we suspect we'll be hearing a lot from the wrestlers that were under his tutelage.

  6. A Compromise Position?: Several members are floating the idea of making Scalise the speaker and making Jordan the Majority Leader. That way, everyone wins. Well, except that Scalise and Jordan don't like each other, Jordan would still be an anchor around the necks of moderates next year, and the Freedom Caucusers do not generally settle for compromise positions.

  7. Dubious Polling: Speaking of Jordan and moderates, Politico and several other outlets reported a poll from National Public Affairs that would seem to be good news for the Ohioan. The poll's finding was that "for likely voters in 11 key swing districts, 47 percent would be more likely to back their current GOP representative in 2024 if they picked Jordan for speaker." In other words, maybe Republican members like the Biden 18 can afford to accept Jordan as their candidate if that's what it takes to unify the Republican Conference.

    This seems like cherry-picking to us, however. Of course there are some Republican voters in swing districts who like Jordan. The problem is the Republicans (and independents and moderate Democrats) who hate him and might vote (D) if their local (R) is associated with a far-right nutter. Further, even if a swing-district member believes Jordan is broadly acceptable right now, can they really be sure that will be true in a year, if he's given a much higher profile and he's had 12 months to perform a bunch of his special brand of political theater?

  8. Surprise, Surprise: Speaker Pro Tempore Patrick McHenry (R-NC), as we expected he would, has concluded that if push comes to shove, he just might have the authority to bring an aid-for-Israel bill to the floor of the House.

Today is the day the guesswork ends, the rubber meets the road, and we learn if the Republicans can pull together or not. We should know by noon ET or so. (Z)

Trump Legal News: Come on, Aileen

We're not doing a daily look at Donald Trump's fraud trial because it's kinda weedy and because there are other outlets where that's their bailiwick. Put another way, if that is what you want, The New York Times and The Washington Post have you covered.

Because the New York Trump trial(s) and the Washington D.C. Trump trial come earlier on the calendar, and because they appear to have a much greater chance of resulting in a guilty verdict, they are sucking up nearly all of the Trump lawbreaking oxygen. That means that Aileen Cannon, down in Florida, is largely flying under the radar. And that, in turn, has allowed her to make some rather questionable decisions without attracting too much attention. Here are the three biggies:

We are hardly experts in federal criminal procedure, especially since every time we've been put on trial, it's been for state-level offenses. However, those who are experts appear to be near-universal in their disdain for Cannon's management of the case, proposing that she's either not capable of handling a case of this magnitude or that she's putting her finger on the scale for Trump. Of course, it's entirely possible that both are true.

Thus far, Special Counsel Jack Smith has behaved as if all is well and normal, and has not tried to get a higher level of the federal court system involved. In fact, just yesterday his team filed a document with the court that implies that the prosecution knows why Trump took the classified files, and that they can prove it. If so, that would certainly address one of the great mysteries of our time.

Might Smith eventually go to a higher authority to get Cannon overruled, or even removed? It's possible; the experts quoted in the second item linked above say that the lack of written explanation last month mirrors Cannon's earlier screw-up that the appeals court chastised her for, and that two strikes could be enough to have her removed. That said, Smith's calendar is going to be pretty full with the Washington case, where he drew a much better hand than in Florida. And after that, Georgia is likely to move to the front of the line. So, it doesn't matter too much if Cannon drags things out, and Smith might decide that the risk of going over the Judge's head and losing are not worth the reward of going over her head and winning. (Z)

Steve Garvey Makes It Official in California...

Former baseball player Steve Garvey has been teasing a run for the open U.S. Senate seat in California, and yesterday he made it official. It's a little odd that he waited until the very week that Dianne Feinstein was laid to rest and her (temporary) replacement Sen. Laphonza Butler (D-CA) was seated, but we guess it's just a coincidence and there's no subtext there.

Now Garvey gets to play the game that all Republicans statewide in California get to play. He will have the (R) next to his name, in hopes of picking up Republican votes, but will pretend he's basically nonpartisan in hopes of getting independent and/or crossover Democratic votes. "In those 20 years that I played for the Dodgers and the Padres, played up in cold Candlestick Park, I never played for Democrats or Republicans or independents," he said in his announcement. "I played for all the fans, and I'm running for all the people." His list of issues includes education, crime, cost of living, housing affordability and homelessness. That's a good list, but is rather different from having actual policy ideas related to those issues. Thus far, Garvey hasn't stepped to the plate to take a swing at an actual proposal, so we'd say he has one strike against him and no balls. See, we can come up with hacky baseball metaphors too.

Nonetheless, we are required by the rules of the Psephologists Guild to consider every high-profile candidacy seriously. So, we will point out that Garvey's "lane" is the celebrity Republican lane. His role model is Arnold Schwarzenegger, who parlayed moderate Republicanism, celebrity and charisma into two statewide victories as governor. Inasmuch as Garvey is 74 and Schwarzenegger is 76, they are even generational peers.

Now the problems with this comparison. To start, Schwarzenegger's first victory came in a recall election, in which a plurality (48%) was enough to win. That literally cannot happen in a U.S. Senate election, thanks to California's top-two runoff system. Oh, and the state is bluer now than it was 20 years ago. Further, Arnold was an A-list, global, mega superstar with off-the-charts charisma when he ran for governor. Garvey is a three-decades-retired "Hall of Very Good" baseball player who will not be familiar to people unless they are: (1) over the age of 45 or 50, (2) sports fans, and probably (3) from Southern California. If we want to put it in movie star terms, it's like Tom Hulce or Ernie Hudson declaring for governor. Sure, they did some big movies in the 1980s, but it's not like they are Tom Cruise or Eddie Murphy.

On top of that, Garvey comes with some baggage. He was a serial philanderer who had multiple children out of wedlock. That may or may not be a problem today, but it certainly was back in the 1980s, since it ran contrary to his wholesome American boy image. On top of that, he acted as spokesman for a sleazy weight-loss product that didn't work, and has had a few other business ventures that raised eyebrows.

Add it up, and we're not seeing a Schwarzenegger clone here; we're seeing something much closer to a Caitlyn Jenner clone. Indeed, Jenner's prime athletic accomplishment was winning the decathlon in 1976, whereas Garvey's was being named NL MVP in 1974. So they too are generational peers. Jenner thought that name recognition and a bunch of vapid pandering would be enough to gain traction in the 2021 gubernatorial recall election, and was proven sadly wrong. A Senate race has a slightly different dynamic, and less competition on the Republican side, so it's at least possible that Garvey finishes in the top two and advances to the general. But it's not likely and, even if he does, he will be crushed by Adam Schiff, Katie Porter or whatever other Democrat he might face. (Z)

...And So Does Kari Lake in Arizona...

This seems like at least the fourth or fifth time that Kari Lake (R) has made it official that she's running for the U.S. Senate seat currently occupied by Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ). But yesterday was her official campaign launch, so we guess it's maga-MAGA-super-total-scrumdiddlyumptious-official now. (Hm. For some reason, our spell-checker does not have scrumdiddlyumptious in it.)

We don't have anything terribly useful to say about Lake's candidacy that we haven't already said. She's going to run in the Trump lane, and will dispatch her main challenger, Sheriff Mark Lamb. Then she will hope and pray, either to the version of Jesus who lives in heaven, or the version who lives in Florida, that she can attract just enough votes in the general election to eke out a victory. It didn't work for her last time, when she "won" the governor's race, it didn't work for MAGA Republicans in the last two Senate races, it didn't work for Donald Trump in 2020, and Arizona is trending blue. But hope springs eternal, we suppose.

Since we don't have much to say about this race, let's review the (relatively small number of) polls of the race that have been taken in the last six months:

Pollster Dates Gallego Lake Sinema Net
National Research Oct. 7-9 33% 37% 29% Lake +4%
Public Policy Polling Oct. 6-7 41% 31% 17% Gallego +10%
Emerson Aug. 2-5 36% 29% 21% Gallego +7%
Noble Predictive Insights Jul. 13-17 34% 25% 26% Gallego +8%
Public Policy Polling Apr. 18-19 42% 35% 14% Gallego +7%
Average   37.2% 31.4% 21.4% Gallego +5.8%

Not too much polling, but what there is generally indicates that Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) is the frontrunner. He probably also has some room to grow his support, since he's got the least name recognition of the trio statewide. (Z)

...And Tom Suozzi in New York

We haven't written too much about Rep. "George Santos" (R-NY) recently, despite his multiple Nobel Prize wins, his entrance into the Forbes 400 list, and his becoming the first living person to be recognized as a saint by the Catholic Church. It is our understanding that he has replaced St. Jude Thaddeus as the patron saint of hopeless cases and desperate situations.

We write about him now, however, as he had a pretty bad day yesterday. To start, given how vulnerable he is as an embarrassing sleazeball in a district that is D+2 and could well get bluer with gerrymandering, the sharks are circling. He has already drawn a staggering 21 primary opponents. That's nine Democrats, nine Republicans and three minor-party candidates. And the ninth of those nine Democrats, who announced yesterday, is a heavy-hitter. It's Tom Suozzi, who represented the district before vacating it to launch a quixotic run for governor. It's possible that he's damaged goods due to that run, but the voters of NY-03 liked him well enough before, and name recognition is pretty important in a nine-way primary. Assuming Suozzi and "Santos" advance, the former will surely knock off the latter. "Santos," for his part, had little to say about his newest would-be challenger.

Perhaps "Santos'" reticence was because he was in the middle of running the first sub-2-hour marathon, and wanted to conserve oxygen. Or it might be because, an hour or so after Suozzi declared, "Santos" was hit with a new indictment from the Department of Justice. The Representative already pleaded not guilty to 13 counts, but the new, superseding, indictment has 23 counts, including one count of conspiracy to commit fraud against the United States and two counts of aggravated identity theft.

In short, barring a near-miracle, "Santos" is cooked. Though maybe he can pray to himself for an intercession. Alternatively, maybe he and Donald Trump can play cards together in the hoosegow, and commiserate about how getting into politics was the worst decision they ever made. (Z)

Today in Things You Already Knew

The Computer Graphics Lab at Stanford has decided to put A.I. to good use, and so developed the Stanford Cable TV News Analyzer, an interesting little toy that lets you figure out how much screen time various people get on the three major cable news outlets. For example, you can use it to learn that John F. Kennedy may be long dead, but he nonetheless got 5.4 minutes of face time across CNN, MSNBC and Fox last month. About 3.5 minutes of that was on CNN, about 1.7 was on Fox, and the meager remainder, about 20 seconds, was on MSNBC.

Axios decided to do a little testing of two Republicans and two Democrats connected to the 2024 presidential race, and how much attention they've gotten over the last year. The Republicans are obvious: Donald Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL). The network that gives far and away the most attention to Trump—more than the other two combined—is... MSNBC. You would be forgiven for guessing Fox, but they are actually a distant third, giving half as much face time to Trump (35 minutes/month right now) as CNN does (79 minutes/month), and only 25% as much as MSNBC (148 minutes/month). Even if Fox is not willing to come out strongly for some other candidate, clearly the Murdochs are doing what they can to deprive The Donald of oxygen.

The semi-vacuum on Fox is not working to the benefit of DeSantis, however. Of the four people who were examined, he got far and away the least attention—this despite the fact that one of the four isn't even running for president. DeSantis is checking in around 10 minutes per month per network. This has been pretty steady over the past year, although he appears to be trending downward at the moment. Not a promising sign for his presidential hopes.

One of the two Democrats is, of course, Joe Biden. Having read this far, you won't be surprised to learn that the network that gives him the most attention is Fox (77 minutes/month right now), with MSNBC in second place (42 minutes/month) and CNN in third (31 minutes/month). Yep, the sitting president gets around 150 minutes/month, whereas his predecessor gets nearly that much from MSNBC alone. Guess it pays to be indicted. Four times.

The other Democrat is... Hunter Biden. Here, Fox takes the lead, of course (38 minutes/month right now), followed by CNN (24 minutes/month) and MSNBC (21 minutes/month). That's right, Fox is actually giving more attention right now to Hunter Biden than it is to Donald Trump. And every outlet is giving the First Son somewhere between two and four times as much face time as DeSantis. Clearly, the Governor needs to find a computer repair shop in Berkeley and to leave his laptop there pronto.

Everyone already knows that: (1) scandal sells, and (2) there's better ratings in negative coverage of the "bad guys" than there is positive coverage of the "good guys" (whoever the bad and good guys might be). But it's nice to have the data to confirm it. (Z)


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