Never Too Late For Predictions?

 

Earlier today, I quoted part of a post from William Steding's blog, Ameritecture, Tomorrow is Almost Here. I left out two paragraphs I didn't want to start a debate about at the time:

Of course, with a nation awash in guns and hatred, there will be blood. People in Kansas have already been shooting each other over yard signs. Hopefully, incidents of ignorance and violence will remain isolated and contained. Depending on where you live, have a plan to hide until cooler heads prevail. Innocents are a bully’s first target. And, a wild-eyed steroidal idiot with an assault rifle may be itching to make his video-game fantasies come true.

When all votes have been counted, and relative calm returns, Obama’s “Hope and Change,” updated by Biden as “Build Back Better,” will return to our doorstep with Joe as its shepherd. Answer the door when you hear the bell. Take a deep breath. Take a nap. Hug yourself. Then, commit yourself anew; prepare to do the crucial work to save our future.

The new work-- saving our future-- must be founded in humility and purpose. Revenge is satisfying, but only for a moment. Evening the score will compromise unification that is so urgently needed to deal with issues like Covid-19 and climate change. Vice must be set aside in favor of virtue. Healing our scarred souls and embracing unity as our highest aim--e pluribus unum-- must become, once again, our north star. Us vs. Them and Win-Lose scenarios have no place in our collective pursuit of redemption. Hate must be put asunder. America’s restoration lies in empowering others rather than coercive schemes of dominance. 

We tried that already... after the Civil War. Instead of hanging every rebel. And the result? The virtual re-enslavement of southern blacks. An inability of our country to move forward because of heel dragging from the descendants of the ones who got away without hanging. Did you watch this video?





Did you ever read any of Hunter S. Thompson's last works, like Kingdom of Fear: Loathsome Secrets of a Star-crossed Child in the Final Days of the American Century (2004)?

We have become a Nazi monster in the eyes of the whole world, a nation of bullies and bastards who would rather kill than live peacefully. We are not just Whores for power and oil, but killer whores with hate and fear in our hearts. We are human scum, and that is how history will judge us. No redeeming social value. Just whores. Get out of our way, or we'll kill you. Who does vote for these dishonest shitheads? Who among us can be happy and proud of having all this innocent blood on our hands? Who are these swine? These flag-sucking half-wits who get fleeced and fooled by stupid little rich kids like George Bush? They are the same ones who wanted to have Muhammad Ali locked up for refusing to kill gooks. They speak for all that is cruel and stupid and vicious in the American character. They are the racists and hate mongers among us; they are the Ku Klux Klan. I piss down the throats of these Nazis. And I am too old to worry about whether they like it or not. Fuck them."

"Fuck the South. Fuck 'em. We should have let them go when they wanted to leave. But no, we had to kill half a million people so they'd stay part of our special Union. Fighting for the right to keep slaves-- yeah, those are states we want to keep. And now what do we get? We're the fucking Arrogant Northeast Liberal Elite?

How about this for arrogant: the South is the Real America? The Authentic America. Really? Cause we fucking founded this country, assholes. Those Founding Fathers you keep going on and on about? All that bullshit about what you think they meant by the Second Amendment giving you the right to keep your assault weapons in the glove compartment because you didn't bother to read the first half of the fucking sentence? Who do you think those wig-wearing lacy-shirt sporting revolutionaries were? They were fucking blue-staters, dickhead.

Boston? Philadelphia? New York? Hello? Think there might be a reason all the fucking monuments are up here in our backyard?

No, No. Get the fuck out. We're not letting you visit the Liberty Bell and fucking Plymouth Rock anymore until you get over your real American selves and start respecting those other nine amendments. Who do you think those fucking stripes on the flag are for? Nine are for fucking blue states. And it would be 10 if those Vermonters had gotten their fucking Subarus together and broken off from New York a little earlier. Get it? We started this shit, so don't get all uppity about how real you are you Johnny-come-lately "Oooooh I've been a state for almost a hundred years" dickheads. Fuck off.

Arrogant? You wanna talk about us Northeasterners being fucking arrogant? What's more American than arrogance? Hmmm? Maybe horsies? I don't think so. Arrogance is the fucking cornerstone of what it means to be American. And I wouldn't be so fucking arrogant if I wasn't paying for your fucking bridges, bitch. All those Federal taxes you love to hate? It all comes from us and goes to you, so shut up and enjoy your fucking Tennessee Valley Authority electricity and your fancy highways that we paid for. And the next time Florida gets hit by a hurricane you can come crying to us if you want to, but you're the ones who built on a fucking swamp. "Let the Spanish keep it, it's a shithole," we said, but you had to have your fucking orange juice.

The next dickwad who says, "It's your money, not the government's money" is gonna get their ass kicked. Nine of the ten states that get the most federal fucking dollars and pay the least... can you guess? Go on, guess. That's right, motherfucker, they're red states. And eight of the ten states that receive the least and pay the most? It's too easy, asshole, they're blue states. It's not your money, assholes, it's fucking our money. What was that Real American Value you were spouting a minute ago? Self reliance? Try this for self reliance: buy your own fucking stop signs, assholes.

Let's talk about those values for a fucking minute. You and your Southern values can bite my ass because the blue states got the values over you fucking Real Americans every day of the goddamn week. Which state do you think has the lowest divorce rate you marriage-hyping dickwads? Well? Can you guess? It's fucking Massachusetts, the fucking center of the gay marriage universe. Yes, that's right, the state you love to tie around the neck of anyone to the left of Strom Thurmond has the lowest divorce rate in the fucking nation. Think that's just some aberration? How about this: 9 of the 10 lowest divorce rates are fucking blue states, asshole, and most are in the Northeast, where our values suck so bad. And where are the highest divorce rates? Care to fucking guess? 10 of the top 10 are fucking red-ass we're-so-fucking-moral states. And while Nevada is the worst, the Bible Belt is doing its fucking part.

But two guys making out is going to fucking ruin marriage for you? Yeah? Seems like you're ruining it pretty well on your own, you little bastards.

Oh, but that's ok because you go to church, right? I mean you do, right? Cause we fucking get to hear about it every goddamn year at election time. Yes, we're fascinated by how you get up every Sunday morning and sing, and then you're fucking towers of moral superiority. Yeah, that's a workable formula. Maybe us fucking Northerners don't talk about religion as much as you because we're not so busy sinning, hmmm? Ever think of that, you self-righteous assholes? No, you're too busy erecting giant stone tablets of the Ten Commandments in buildings paid for by the fucking Northeast Liberal Elite. And who has the highest murder rates in the nation? It ain't us up here in the North, assholes.

Well this gravy train is fucking over. Take your liberal-bashing, federal-tax-leaching, confederate-flag-waving, holier-than-thou, hypocritical bullshit and shove it up your ass. And no, you can't have your fucking convention in New York next time.

Fuck off.

That said, let's look at predictions for today from Washington Post columnist Henry Olsen. I see a landslide; he doesn't but he is clear that Biden "will win comfortably unless we experience the greatest polling failure in modern history. Democrats will also gain control of the Senate and expand their majority in the House." He believes that Trump will lose every state Hillary won and lose 7 states that he won in 2016-- Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin + NE-02 (but, according to him, not ME-02).

As far as the Senate goes, he's on the straight and narrow, predicting losses for Martha McSally (R-AZ), Cory Gardner (R-CO), Susan Collins (R-ME), Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Doug Jones (D-AL)... so the narrowest of Democratic Senate majorities, dependent on right-of-center Dems like Manchin, Sinema, Warner, Carper, Hickenlooper, Kelly, Cunningham... to do anything. In other words, the progressive agenda is going nowhere. Both Georgia's Senate seats will be decided in run-offs.

In the House he predicts 30 pickups and 10 losses. I actually wish he was right about the Democratic looses in the House-- Dems would be better off without them-- but he's wrong, probably on all ten! The ten seats he sees the Dems losing Collin Peterson (Blue Dog-MN)-- the most likely to lose of any of them but I bet he hangs on-- TJ Cox (New Dem-CA), Debbie Mucarsel-Powell (New Dem-FL), Abby Finkenauer (de facto New Dem-IA), Xochitl Torres-Small (Blue Dog-NM), Max Rose (Blue Dog-NY), Anthony Brindisi (Blue Dog-NY), Kendra Horn (Blue Dog-OK), Joe Cunningham (Blue Dog-SC) and Ben McAdams (Blue Dog-UT). I hope he's right on some of them but if I had to bet, I'd bet they all are reelected and then lose in 2022.

The 30 districts he thinks are Democratic pick-ups start with the 2 gimmes: the two ungerryamndered North Carolina red seats, NC-02 and NC-06. Then (+ his predictions of new members):

• AK- Alyse Galvin
• AZ-06- Hiral Tipirneni
• AR-02- Joyce Elliott
• CA-25- Christy Smith
• CO-03- Diane Mitsch Bush
• GA-07- Carolyn Bourdeaux
• IL-13- Betsy Londrigan
• IN-05- Christina Hale
• MI-03- Hillary Scholten
• MI-06- Jon Hoadley
• MN-01- Dan Feehan
• MO-02- Jill Schupp
• MT- Kathleen Williams
• NE-02- Kara Eastman
• NJ-02- Amy Kennedy
• NY-02- Jackie Gordon
• NY-24- Dana Balter
• NC-08- Patricia Timmons
• NC-11- Moe Davis
• OH-01- Kate Schroder
• PA-01- Christina Finello
• PA-10- Eugene DePasquale
• TX-10- Mike Siegel
• TX-21- Wendy Davis
• TX-22- Sri Kulkarni
• TX-23- Gina Ortiz Jones
• TX-24- Candace Valenzuela
• VA-05- Cameron Webb

I want to compare two freshmen from Orange County, California-- Katie Porter and Harley Rouda. In 2018, Katie's district (CA-45) handed her a 158,906 (52.1%) to 146,383 (47.9%) win over incumbent Mimi Walters. Meanwhile Rouda beat the notorious Russian spy Dana Rohrabacher 157,837 (53.6) to 136,899 (46.4%). Rouda won bigger. But he joined the New Dems and has established himself as a do-nothing waste of a seat who is firmly ensconced as a pointless member the Republican wing of the Democratic Party. He's done exactly nothing and there is no reason to reelect him except that his Republican challenger is worse. Katie, on the other hands so beloved that the Republicans figured out she is unbeatable. She has distinguished herself in Congress as a total asset and she is untouchable.

This year Katie raised $15 million to her opponent's $1,265,078. The DCCC quickly saw she needed no outside help and contributed $840 in independent money in her race, in other words, nothing. Rouda, on the other hand, does nothing but beg for money day in and day out has only been able to raise $5,426,654, slightly less than his opponent. Because he's been such a total waste and with nothing to offer to anyone (except her donors) the DCCC and Pelosi's SuperPAC had to rush to save his worthless hide by spending nearly $10 million on his race. He'll win-- and probably lose in 2022-- but is it really worth $10 million to keep him. Why not just recruit talented and dedicated leaders like Katie Porter instead of Republican-retreads like Harley Rouda?

Most of the DCCC recruits this cycle are as bad as-- or worse-- the Harley Rouda. Schumer's Senate recruits are generally even worse. I llooked over Olsen's predictions and bolded the names of the candidates who are more like Katie Porter and less like Harley Rouda. Keep it so you can check up on me in 2 years.

Asterisked-- The Worst President In History by Nancy Ohanian