Not Just Señor Trumpanzee-- The WHOLE DAMN PARTY... "There Is No Bottom To The Barrel Of Vitriol"

Yesterday, House Democrats-- without buy-in from any of the Democrats' conservative establishment leadership-- voted against Al Green's resolution to begin a formal investigation into impeaching Trump by sending his resolution to the Judiciary Committee to die. The Republicans and the Pelosi-faithful voted 332-95 against impeachment. Imagine if the Reichstag had had the opportunity to impeach Hitler and passed. Anti-impeachment votes that might surprise you:

• Justin Amash (I-MI)
• Judy Chu (D-CA)
• Elijah Cummings (D-MD)
• Deb Haaland (D-NM)
• Ro Khanna (D-CA)
• John Lewis (D-GA)
• Katie Porter (D-CA)
• Adam Schiff (D-CA)
• Mark Takano (D-CA)

The last two times Green forced a vote on impeachment-- before the current freshmen, who are overwhelmingly conservative and extremely cowardly-- were in office, he got around 60 votes. The 95 Democrats who opposed the McCarthy and Pelosi scheme to kill the resolution yesterday were:

You'll have to click on the image to read the heroes' names

Trump told the Daily Mail that he's not unhappy with the result of this week's brouhaha that left him branded a racist. Perhaps he should stop behaving like a racist if he doesn't like being branded a racist.

Meanwhile, Katie Edmondson, reporting for the NY Times yesterday before the vote, wrote that "The NRCC, with the blessing of House Republican leaders, has adopted a no-holds-barred strategy to win back the House majority next year, borrowing heavily from President Trump’s playbook in deploying such taunts and name-calling. After losing 40 seats and the House majority in November, Representative Tom Emmer of Minnesota, the committee’s new chairman, and Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the Republican leader, decided that their messaging needed to be ruthless."

Ruthless? Well, they portray Adam Schiff-- where Trump got 22.3% of the vote in 2016 and where Schiff beat GOP opponent Johnny Nalbandian, 196,662 (78.4%) to 54,272 (21.6%) last year-- wearing clown makeup. This cycle, deranged far right crazy person, Eric Early, the endorsed GOP candidate against Schiff, is unlikely to even get to the general election, since the jungle primary is likely to see progressive Democrat Maebe A. Girl come in second, setting up a D vs D race in November. "Democratic congressional candidates-- including an Air Force combat veteran-- are labeled 'socialist losers' or anti-Semites. Others have been singled out as Lyin’ Lucy McBath, Fake Nurse Lauren Underwood, Little Max Rose and China Dan McCready." This is hardly a new trick by the GOP. When they tried the socialism scare tactic in 1932 and '36, FDR won both times, 57.4% to 39.7% in 1932 and then-- as the GOP continued screeching "Socialism!"-- 60.8% to 36.5% in 1936, the GOP taking just 8 electoral votes to FDR's 523. But that wasn't all the Republicans' brilliant strategy accomplished. Going into the 1930 election, there were 270 Republicans in the House and just 164 Democrats. This is how the GOP "Socialism!!" strategy worked out for them:

• 1930- The Republicans lost 52 seats and lost control of the chamber
• 1932- The Republicans lost 101 more seats bringing their total to 117
• 1934- The Republicans lost another 14 seats-- and then there were just 103 of them left whining about "Socialism!!"
• 1936- Another 15 GOP seats down the tube, leaving just 88 of them annoying the 334 Democrats, 8 Progressives and 5 Farmer-Labor Party members.

I won't go through the same exercise for the Senate. Suffice it to say that in 1928 there were 56 Republicans and 39 Democrats but after 8 years of the Republicans screaming "Socialism!!" the 1936 elections left the GOP with only 17 senators to the Democrats' 74 (+ one Progressive and 2 from the Farmer-Worker Party).

It's not going to go as well now as it did then because Democrats used to know how to fight that toxicity and Pelosi and Schumer are both utterly clueless, cowardly, status quo, Republican-lite, Establishment suck-ups. with more in common with the Republicans of that era than with their own predecessors from the FDR party. Still, the Republican strategy is likely to fail. Back to Catie Edmondson:

The offensive hinges largely on the relatively facile notion that by tagging all House Democrats as socialists, anti-Semites or far-left extremists, Republicans will be able to alienate swing-state voters. On Tuesday night, after the House voted to condemn as racist President Trump’s attacks on four congresswoman, the campaign arm’s communications team deluged reporters’ inboxes with message after message calling vulnerable Democratic lawmakers “deranged.”

Their tactics have discomforted some Republicans and highlighted the struggle in the party over how much to lean into the tenor of politics forged by their leader.

“To devolve into childish name-calling usually doesn’t win the argument. I think we can do better,” said Tom Rooney, a former five-term Republican representative from Florida. “Maybe this is what the donors to the NRCC want to hear nowadays. Maybe name-calling raises money, and that’s what we’ve become.”

...Committee officials show no sign of tempering their attacks.

“We make no apologies for aggressively calling out the anti-Semitic racists in the socialist Democratic Party totally consumed by their hatred of President Trump and America,” Chris Pack, the communications director of the campaign arm, said in a statement.

Mr. McCarthy, too, stood firm behind the strategy. He praised Mr. Emmer’s “strong tactical sense and impressive work ethic” in a statement.

“As a conference, we are united behind his vision to campaign on offense-- and expand the map by outworking, out-recruiting and exposing the corrupt, inept new Democrat Socialist Party,” Mr. McCarthy said.

Republican campaign operatives backing the strategy argued that aggressive tactics were necessary to rouse the interests of sleepy and shrunken local press corps. Adopting the mantra that “all news is good news,” the committee appears to believe that even if reporters choose instead to write about its bare-knuckled tactics, they are at least reiterating the nicknames and points that House Republicans hope will reach voters.

“If that’s what it takes to get a story,” said Mike Shields, who joined the National Republican Congressional Committee as director of its independent expenditure program in 2009 and helped Republicans win a 63-seat gain. “There needs to be a shift in mind-set to be in the majority. It’s better than getting no coverage at all.”

But the unrestrained use of nicknames also has provoked public outcry. After the committee issued a statement in early June mocking the stature of Mr. Rose, a moderate Democrat from New York, who stands at 5 feet 6 inches, even some Republicans came to his defense.

“Instead of working on bipartisan issues, Little Max Rose is content passing socialist bills” for “giggles,” Michael McAdams, a spokesman for the committee, wrote in an official release that used an epithet before giggles. “Playtime is over, Max.”

Members already displeased with what they felt were needlessly aggressive personal attacks felt the committee had crossed a line by taunting a veteran: Mr. Rose served in the Army for almost five years and was wounded in Afghanistan, earning a Purple Heart. Representative Mike Gallagher, Republican of Wisconsin, called it a “stupid tactic and a counterproductive tag.”

“I hope the lesson the NRCC draws from that is to not do it again,” Mr. Gallagher said.

Representative Adam Kinzinger, Republican of Illinois and another veteran, told Politico: “The president’s got his own unique style. I don’t think we need to mimic it.” When Mr. Rooney saw the statement on Twitter, reposted by a Fox News reporter, he publicly expressed his disappointment with Mr. Emmer, calling out the committee chairman and commenting, “This isn’t you.” Mr. Pack, the chief spokesman for the committee, chimed in, “No, that’s Max Rose.”

Mr. Rooney shot back: “That’s not what I’m referring to. Maybe there’s a better conservative argument to counter his support of this legislation than calling him ‘little.’ At least that would be my advice to my 13-year-old.”

The exchange is only one of the Twitter scrapes that has spilled into public view. While committee messaging is, by nature, meant to attract the attention of the news media-- especially among local outlets in battleground districts-- party insiders have worried they have not attracted the right kind of attention.

When Jill Burcum, an editorial writer for the Minneapolis Star Tribune and a Pulitzer Prize finalist, took issue with the committee’s depiction of Mr. Schiff as a clown, Mr. Pack responded on Twitter. Using the same motley photo, he reiterated that Mr. Schiff was a “socialist clown” and added, "Don’t let your apparent bias blind you from that fact.”

When the committee called a little-known Air Force combat veteran who is running for Ohio’s First Congressional District a “socialist loser,” it struck a nerve: A columnist for the Cincinnati Enquirer panned the attack on the veteran, Nikki Foster, who flew missions over Iraq and Afghanistan, as “G.O.P. desperation.”

“In doing so, the congressional Republicans’ fund-raising arm brought attention to a candidate no one knew about. Why even go there?” the columnist, Jason Williams, wrote.

It's hilarious that prime GOP targets Anthony Brindisi (Blue Dog-NY), Joe Cunningham (Blue Dog-SC) and Jefferson Van Drew (Blue Dog-NJ) vote more conservatively than Republican incumbents Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA), Thomas Massie (R-KY) and John Katko (R-NY). Are those Republicans "deranged socialists" too? Generally many of the other NRCC top targets-- like Josh Gottheimer (NJ), Cindy Axne (IA), Xochitl Torres Small (NM), Elaine Luria (VA), Jared Golden (ME), Kendra (OK) and Ben Adams (UT)-- have very similar voting records to vulnerable Republicans, beyond the 3 already mentioned, Elise Stefanik (NY), Chris Smith (NJ), Morgan Griffith (VA) and, sometimes, Andy Biggs (AZ), Tom McClintock (CA), Fred Upton (MI)-- one of the 4 who voted to condemn Trump's racist tweets on Tuesday-- Ted Yoho (FL), Jim Sensenbrenner (WI), Chip Roy (TX) and Brian Mast (FL). I guess they're counting on their low-info, Fox-brainwashed base to not connect the dots.

I wonder if the Republicans think it's going to help their cause that they blocked the Democrats' attempt to pass an extension of the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund. Rand Paul and some other Republican extremists oppose paying self-responders promised compensation because the debt is too big. Maybe that's because they keep passing tax cuts for the wealthy.

This morning, McConnell stoked the fires of fascism even further. He told Fox Business News "I think the president is on to something and made it seem like Trump's vicious racist attack against AOC, Ilhan, Ayanna and Rashida was about stopping "socialism"-- which is how the GOP defines the Green New Deal and Medicare for All. As Trump changed his attack from "they should go back" to "send them back," McConnell response was "We're in a big debate now and next year about what we want America to be like. Do we really think socialism applies here at a time of great prosperity, 50-year-low unemployment? That's what the election I think is going to be about."

This morning, reporting for the AP, Steve Peoples and Zeke Miller reported that "Trump has placed racial animus at the center of his reelection campaign, and even some of his critics believe it could deliver him a second term. Every successful modern presidential campaign has been built on the notion of addition, winning over voters beyond core supporters. But Trump has chosen division on the belief that the polarized country he leads will simply choose sides over issues like race."

He intensified his attacks on Wednesday, blasting four young congresswomen of color during a rally in Greenville, North Carolina. The crowd responded by chanting, “Send her back!” echoing Trump’s weekend tweet in which he said the lawmakers, all American citizens, should “go back” to the countries from which they came.

“I do think I am winning the political fight,” Trump declared at the White House. “I think I am winning it by a lot.”

Not since George Wallace’s campaign in 1968 has a presidential candidate-- and certainly not an incumbent president-- put racial polarization at the center of his call to voters. Though Trump’s comments generated outrage and even a resolution of condemnation in the House, the president and his campaign believe the strategy carries far more benefits than risks.

“Regardless of whether his tweets are racist or not — I’m not saying they are or not — he is getting the media to make these extremely liberal, socialist, foolish congresswomen the face of the Democratic Party,” said Terry Sullivan, a frequent Trump critic who managed Sen. Marco Rubio’s 2016 Republican presidential campaign. “What he’s doing here is sad, but it’s smart politics.”

Still, there are clear perils to his approach.

Educated suburban voters, especially college-educated women, and minorities in key states like Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin were already threatening to revolt against the Republican president. Trump believes his inflammatory rhetoric will strengthen his support among the white working class and attract a new group of disaffected voters who fear cultural changes across America.

That approach is likely to face significant headwinds in those three key battleground states that he won by a combined 78,000 votes in 2016. Democrats will be far more aggressive in targeting female and minority voters. Most analysts agree that the potential universe of Democratic-leaning voters is larger, if they turn out. Trump is betting they will not.

The president has proved adroit at crafting a hero-villain narrative and is now focusing on Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan rather than a Democratic presidential candidate. His challenge will be whether he can drive that story line successfully for the next 16 months.

Trump told aides this week that the controversy has cemented the four progressive lawmakers as the faces of the Democratic Party, believing it has boosted his chances at reelection. Far from backing away from the comments, he and his party are now casting the minority Democratic congresswomen as the real racists.

“They are now the top, most visible members of the House Democrats, who are now wedded to this bitterness and hate,” Trump boasted on Twitter.

Trump aides and allies acknowledge that many voters may find the president’s comments objectionable, but for the voters they need in 2020, it may actually be an energizing force.

Those who already believe Trump is a racist and unfit for the presidency won’t vote for him in the first place. For voters in the middle, Trump’s team believes they can be sufficiently scared off the progressive agenda to cast votes for Trump-- or at worst, stay home in dispiritedness that neither party speaks to their issues. And for many others who didn’t vote at all in 2016, there is hope that his dramatic presidency, backed by fear of Democrats’ leftward lurch, will persuade them to show up at the ballot box.

Trump’s allies say they think many voters, both Republican and Democratic, are cool to the “woke culture” of 2019, just as they were to the focus on political correctness in 2016.

The Pew Research Center found in May that 8 in 10 Republicans feel too many people are easily offended over language today. About 4 in 10 Democrats said the same.

“The president wasn’t afraid to wade into these culture wars and he’s not afraid to do so again. He’ll stand up for our flag and against open borders. Patriotism will always win,” said Kelly Sadler, a spokeswoman for the pro-Trump super PAC America First Policies. The group plans to spend millions over the coming year on registering likely Trump voters across six swing states.

Veering sharply away from the inclusive tone GOP leaders called for in 2012, groups charged with electing Republicans up and down the ballot in 2020 have embraced Trump’s fiery style and message, which has long relied on demonizing immigrants and minorities.

Some voters may be responding.

The share of Americans who say the country’s openness to people from around the world is “essential to who we are as a nation” is shrinking, according to a new Pew poll.

The poll found that 62% of Americans see openness to others around the world as essential, a number that is down 6 percentage points over the last 10 months. Nearly 6 in 10 Republicans and Republican-leaning independents said that if the United States is too open to people from around the world, “we risk losing our identity as a nation.” Pollsters in both parties said that white working-class voters in particular feel left behind by the Democratic Party’s focus on racial and gender equality. Trump’s hard-line position on race and immigration has alienated many minority voters.

Republican pollsters suggest the president’s real challenge will be in America’s suburbs, where college-educated women veered sharply away from Trump’s party in the 2018 midterms, giving Democrats the House majority.

“He went with racism and divisiveness before 2018 and lost 40 House seats-- including in the Midwest,” said Josh Schwerin, senior strategist for Priorities USA, the biggest super PAC in Democratic politics. “He has tried this. The country doesn’t want to be more divided.”

In June, Trump was down 4 points in North Carolina. It will be extremely interesting to watch for the July and then the August polling numbers, particularly for that state, without whose 15 electoral votes, Trump has absolutely no path to reelection.