Republicans, Blue Dogs And New Dems Don't Understand What Impeachment Is All About

Me The People by Nancy Ohanian

Most Americans seem to understand that the gravity of impeachment goes beyond mere partisan considerations. To put it simply, if Trump isn't held accountable for his criminal behavior, that lack of action will serve as a green light for future criminal behavior, not just by him but by any asshole who comes after him. The Republicans and the Republican wing of the Democratic Party do not get that, not at all. They are consumed with self-serving partisanship and can't see beyond their next primary or general election.

This week Sarah Ferris and Heather Caygle, reporting for Politico, noted that the Blue Dogs and New Dems are warning the caucus to steer clear of the serious crimes brought up by the Mueller report and just stick to Ukraine. The far right of the Democratic Party-- which Politico cagily always refers to as "moderates"-- especially freshman schnooks wetting their panties over reelection, "have urged Democrats not to relitigate the issues in the Mueller report in their own investigation into the Ukraine scandal. But key Democrats, including House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler, have suggested that it could be included in eventual articles of impeachment, with many in the caucus still eager to repudiate Trump for his misconduct outlined by Mueller.

One of the most conservative and cowardly of all the worthless Blue Dogs, Ben McAdams (D-UT): "Activities from the 2016 election, I think, should be left to voters in the 2020 election. My focus is on those things that are forward looking." Basically just as bad as McAdams, a former Republican state legislator pretending to be a Democrat now, slow-witted Blue Dog co-chair Tom O'Halleran, agrees: "I would prefer that we stick to what we have." Elissa Slotkin is an utterly worthless and spineless New Dem from Michigan who the party should be eager to lose. An especially vile creature, she votes like a Republican and sits around whining about losing her reelection bid. "I know that there's some people who are interested in kind of a kitchen sink approach-- let's throw all kinds of things in there because we can and talk about all the things we're concerned about regarding the president. We have been taking the country down this road on this very targeted issue of Ukraine and the issues around the president using his office for personal and political gain. And that's what I think we should focus on." If you survey Democratic staffers and ask them to name the 5 most brain-dead Democrats in Congress, every single list will include Slotkin. Sick of values-free cowards in Congress? That's why we've included the thermometer on the right. And this suggestion from Omaha progressive Kara Eastman on how to respond to impeachment in a purple district:

The warning from vulnerable Democrats follows Nadler’s remarks at the Judiciary panel’s first impeachment hearing Wednesday in which he made a significant connection between Trump’s obstruction of Mueller’s investigation into Russian election interference and his potential abuse of power in pressuring Ukraine to help his reelection campaign.

“President Trump welcomed foreign interference in the 2016 election. He demanded it for the 2020 election,” Nadler said in his opening statement. “In both cases, he got caught. And in both cases, he did everything in his power to prevent the American people from learning the truth about his conduct.”

Mueller’s 448-page report caused a fraught debate within the caucus after its release this spring over whether to punish Trump for acts he allegedly committed before he was president-- as well as instances in which the White House attempted to interfere with the investigation itself. Some Democrats also feared that Mueller’s report and the allegations within it were too dense and difficult to communicate clearly to the American public.

Mueller and his team ultimately outlined 11 examples of potential obstruction of justice by Trump, and the Democrats' attempts to deepen that probe eventually brought Speaker Nancy Pelosi to back an impeachment inquiry in court.

I grew up in Brooklyn-- same neighborhood and same elementary and high school as Bernie-- but we were always taught that California was the face of the future and where California was today, the rest of America, each region at its own pace, would be tomorrow or the day after or-- in the case of The South-- a decade later. I don't know if that is still taught in Brooklyn schools but I have noticed that the axiom still holds., although maybe or maybe not electorally. Yesterday, L.A. Times reporter Janet Hook took a look at the new election survey by the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies and let's hope the rest of the country catches up-- fast instead of sinking into the morass of personalized by Slotkin, McAdams and O'Halleran. Hook reports that Elizabeth and Status Quo Joe have been losing ground as Bernie rises on the left and Mayo Pete rises on the right.

The Iowa caucuses are in less than two months and California absentee ballots for the state’s March 3 primary will be going out around the same time. And there's more good news besides finding Bernie in the #1 slot in the state with the richest haul of delegates. "Bloomberg," she wrote, "appears ill-equipped to break into the mix. The poll, which was taken Nov. 21-27, just as Bloomberg started advertising in California and elsewhere on Nov. 25, found that he began his campaign with the most negative image of any candidate in the field. About 40% of the likely Democratic primary voters surveyed viewed him negatively, and just 15% had a positive impression."

The upshot of the poll is that the field’s most liberal candidates, Warren and Sanders, are in a statistical tie for first place. The leading candidates making a more moderate pitch, Biden and Buttigieg, are lagging and essentially tied for third place.

Sanders is in the nominal lead, as the first-choice pick of 24%; Warren is the first pick of 22%. That is a big change from September, when she led the field with 29%.

Biden is the first choice of 14%, down six points from September. Buttigieg is preferred by 12%, up six points from September.

The poll was taken before California Sen. Kamala Harris dropped out of the race. It asked whom her supporters would name as their second choice if she quit and found that Warren and Biden would benefit the most. If Harris voters were reallocated based on those responses, the race would tighten at the top to Sanders, 25%; Warren, 24%; Biden, 17%; Buttigieg, 13%.

California will affect the prospects of all candidates because it has the largest number of delegates at next summer’s Democratic nominating convention. It is especially important for Bloomberg, a multibillionaire and former New York City mayor. He is skipping the first nominating contests and counting on a big splash March 3 in the so-called Super Tuesday primaries in 17 states and territories, including California.

The Berkeley IGS poll, which was three-quarters complete before Bloomberg’s ads started running, found 8% were considering voting for Bloomberg.

Whether his big spending on ads can change the negative image he brings to the race will be a test of the power of money in politics, but the record on such efforts — by rich presidential candidates such as Ross Perot, who ran as an independent in 1992, and Steve Forbes, a Republican candidate in 2000-- is not promising.

California billionaire Tom Steyer also has made a heavy investment in his own 2020 presidential bid, and his campaign is still floundering: Just 1% of California voters in the Berkeley-IGS survey said Steyer was their first choice, and only 18% viewed him favorably.

Among the top-tier candidates, the opinion shifts among Californians are similar to trends found in other polls nationally and in key early-voting states. Warren is coming back down to earth after a heady run-up in polling this summer and fall; Sanders is regaining traction after an October heart attack unsettled his campaign; and Biden is facing increased competition from Buttigieg among voters who think Warren and Sanders are too far left.

Warren’s image has suffered over the last few months, during which she has struggled to answer the question of how she would overhaul the healthcare system. Her favorability rating remains high, with 67% viewing her positively, but that is down 10 points since September.

Still, the poll found that Warren had more room to increase support among California Democrats than any other candidate: 58% said they at least considered supporting her, compared with the 49% who were considering Sanders, 41% considering Buttigieg and 39% considering Biden.

The poll also provided a window into the perceived strengths of the candidates-- and why Biden has come in a weak third compared with his stronger standing in national polls.

Biden led the field when California voters were asked which candidate had the best chance of beating Trump and which was best qualified to serve as president: 29% said he was the most electable, and 28% said he was best qualified, compared with Sanders’ second-place ranking on those points, with 22% and 24%, respectively.

But Biden drops to single digits behind other candidates on other qualities: Just 6% said he was the candidate with the sharpest mental abilities, compared with the 24% who picked Warren, who leads the field on that attribute.

Sanders tops the field on three other attributes-- being the candidate who would bring the right kind of change to Washington (28%), the one who comes closest to sharing voters’ values (27%) and the candidate who best understands the problems of “people like you” (28%).

The poll found that the four septuagenarian candidates-- Sanders, 78; Biden and Bloomberg, 77; Warren, 70-- faced differing levels of concern about their age.

About one-third said they were extremely or very concerned that Biden’s and Sanders’ age would hurt their ability to serve as president. Only 7% said that about Warren; 17% said so about Bloomberg.

The poll found increasingly stiff three-way competition in California for older voters, a part of the electorate that has been especially important to Biden’s national standing. Both he and Warren lost ground among those 65 and older over the last few months, while Buttigieg gained among that group, a prized bloc because it tends to vote in large numbers.

Biden narrowly leads with 22% of the over-65 vote, down from 26% in September. Warren’s share dropped to 18%, from 32% in September. Buttigieg supporters, meanwhile, increased to 17% of those seniors, from just 7% in September.

Sanders’ campaign, by contrast, hinges on his ability to turn out younger voters who are less inclined than their elders to vote: He barely registered among older voters but was the first choice of 46% of voters ages 18 to 29. That contributes to the advantage Sanders has among Latino voters, who tend to be younger as a group than other ethnicities. In California, 32% of Latino Democrats favor Sanders, a solid 13-point margin over the next closest candidate, Biden, who has 19%.

Here's one reason Bernie is so popular among younger voters-- and why younger voters aren't taking Status Quo Joe seriously... other than as a serious threat to their futures.