Iowans May Not Understand The Nature Of Pandemics-- And They May Not Be The Only Americans Who Don't

In all likelihood Americans will go to the polls in November knowing over a quarter million of our fellow citizens had died-- most needlessly-- because of Republican mishandling on the pandemic. By early next year, deaths will tick up beyond 300,000. How do Republicans defend themselves when it has been their policies and their incompetence that are behind the catastrophe? They deny it. It's a hoax; it's the media out to get them; the numbers are fake; it's just a bunch of fat old people who would have died anyway. Yesterday, Joni Ernst hadn't gotten so much national press for her clueless comments about pandemic deaths since it came out she used to be a hog castrator before being elected to the U.S. Senate in 2014. As the Washington Post put it Wednesday: "Ernst’s comments echo conspiracy theories pushed by QAnon followers that have been debunked by doctors and public health experts." She told a crowd of Republicans near Waterloo-- hopefully her Waterloo-- that "These health-care providers and others are reimbursed at a higher rate if covid is tied to it, so what do you think they’re doing?" That's a conspiracy theory straight out of Q-Anon.

Critics lashed out at Ernst over the claim, including Democrat Theresa Greenfield, who is seeking to unseat her in a November election expected to be tight.

“It’s appalling for you to say you’re ‘so skeptical’ of the toll this pandemic has on our families and communities across Iowa,” Greenfield said in a tweet directed at Ernst. “We need leaders who will take this seriously.”

...Her inaccurate figure of 10,000 or fewer covid-19 deaths is similar to a widely spread QAnon meme that misinterpreted a recent study published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That study said the coronavirus was the only contributing factor in 6 percent of reported deaths. The conspiracy theory that claims the U.S. death toll is inflated incorrectly assumes that only 6 percent of deaths should be counted in the covid-19 death tally. The study does not support that claim.

In the other 94 percent of coronavirus deaths, the victims had at least one other contributing factor. Those deaths still count toward the overall number of deaths caused by the virus. Health experts have known since the early days of the pandemic that preexisting conditions, such as asthma, diabetes and heart disease, increase a patient’s likelihood to die of a coronavirus infection.

The suggestion that the U.S. death toll has been inflated has been echoed by QAnon accounts and even retweeted by President Trump. When Trump on Sunday retweeted a QAnon follower named “Mel Q” who made the claim on Twitter, the social media site removed the tweet for spreading false information about the pandemic.

In the past week, new coronavirus cases have spiked by nearly 84 percent in Ernst’s state and the death toll increased by 25 percent. Nightclubs, concert venues and sporting arenas are still closed in Iowa, but most other businesses have been allowed to reopen and children are required to attend in-person classes at public schools throughout the state.

The senator’s unfounded claims inspired backlash from some observers, who viewed the remarks as undermining health-care workers who have been on the front lines of the pandemic.

“Senator Ernst is from Iowa, where currently is having one of the WORST #COVID19 OUTBREAKS hotspot in the entire nation as a region, and some say maybe the world,” Eric Feigl-Ding, an epidemiologist, health economist and senior fellow at the Federation of American Scientists, tweeted Tuesday in response to Ernst’s comments. “To deny that is to deny the suffering of Iowans.”

COVID-Kim (R-IA)

Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds-- backed by a GOP-controlled state legisalture-- has been responsible for one of the worst over-all responses to the pandemic of any governor in America. A 100% Trump puppet, she has consistently ignored science and public health best practices in favor of partisan and ideological gobblygook that has killed 1,125 Iowans. The state reported 646 new cases yesterday, bringing the total to 66,136-- or 20,962 cases per million Iowans-- a far worse rate than any European country, including Spain (10,073 cases per million), Sweden (8,361 cases per million) and Italy (4,470 cases per million).

In 2016, Iowa nearly ceased being a swing state. After two consecutive wins there for Obama, the state's voters overwhelmingly rejected Hillary Clinton's status quo message and Trump won Iowa's 6 electoral votes 800,983 (51.15%) to 653,669 (41.74%). Hillary won just 6 of the state's 99 counties. Two years later, the anti-red wave returned 2 of the state's 3 GOP congressional districts to Democratic hands. And current presidential polling average is firmly back in swing state territory. Trump leads Biden 46.7-45.0%. (1.7 points). The most recent poll from the Des Moines Register is a dead heat within the margin of error-- 44-43% with Trump ahead.

An even more recent Iowa poll by Monmouth shows registered voters giving a slight edge to Ernst over Democrat Theresa Greenfield, 48-45%. The poll results, though, seem to indicate that many Iowans don't understand the nature of pandemics and it is likely to require many more cases and deaths before Iowans will understand how contagious diseases work and how they can be stopped. With many Iowans opting for simplistic partisan tropes to deal with the pandemic, it will be probably some time before Iowa is part of the solution rather than part of the problem.

Donald J Trump-- Electoral Albatross

Cone of Shame by Nancy Ohanian

Since Trump took over the White, U.S. influence abroad has tanked-- and just a year into his presidency U.S. leadership approval had already hit an all-time low. It's taken a while, but most Americans have now caught on. Gallup reported an astounding new 38/57% approval/disapproval for Trump yesterday. And as Jonathan Bernstein explained for Bloomberg News, "there’s just no way that a president is going to be re-elected with a solid majority thinking he has failed in office... The big problem for Trump is that no elected president in the modern era has improved dramatically between this point and the election.

Gabe Sherman, writing for Vanity Fair really knows how to get under Trump's orange-hued skin and he noted yesterday that with Señor Trumpanzee's "approval sinking to Jimmy Carter levels and coronavirus cases spiking across the country, Trump is reluctantly waking up to the grim reality that, if the current situation holds, his reelection is gone. Republicans that have spoken with Trump in recent days describe him as depressed and 'down in the dumps.' 'People around him think his heart’s not in it,' a Republican close to the White House said. Torn between the imperative to win suburban voters and his instincts to play to his base, Trump has complained to people that he’s in a political box with no obvious way out. According to the Republican, Trump called Tucker Carlson late last week and said, 'what do I do? What do I do?'"

To console himself, Trump still has moments of magical thinking. “He says the polls are all fake,” a Republican in touch with Trump told me. But the bad news keeps coming. This week, Jacksonville, Florida-- where Trump moved the Republican National Convention so he could hold a 15,000-person rally next month-- mandated that people wear masks indoors to slow the explosion of COVID-19 cases. According to a Republican working on the convention, the campaign is now preparing to cancel the event so that Trump doesn’t suffer another Tulsa–like humiliation. “They probably won’t have it,” the source said. “It’s not going to be the soft landing Trump wanted.”

...Trump remains furious at his son-in-law Jared Kushner, whom he blames for the campaign’s dismal poll numbers. Axios reported this week that Trump complained privately that Kushner’s advice on criminal-justice reform damaged Trump politically. But because Kushner is family, sources say it’s unlikely that Trump will formally strip him of authority.

Kushner’s vast sway over West Wing decisions has become a flashpoint between him and Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, sources say. The two have been engaged in a cold war over control of the campaign. Meadows pushed Trump to replace campaign manager Brad Parscale, a Kushner ally, the Republican close to the White House said. Kushner wasn’t happy that Meadows is close with Kushner’s adversaries Corey Lewandowski and David Bossie. “Meadows is in real shit. He went to war with Jared and tried to get Brad out,” the Republican, briefed on the internal debate, told me. A couple weeks ago, Meadows unloaded about Kushner over dinner with his predecessor, Mick Mulvaney, at Sette Osteria near the White House. “All Mark did was complain how much operational control Jared has and how it leaves very little space for the chief of staff,” said a Republican briefed on the conversation. “Mark whined to Mick, ‘why didn’t you warn me before I accepted the job? There’s nothing for me to do.’”

Nervous Republicans worried about losing the Senate are now debating when to break from Trump. Trump campaign internal polls show Trump’s level of “strong support” dropping from 21 to 17 points since last week, a person briefed on the numbers said. A source close to Iowa Republican Joni Ernst’s campaign said Ernst advisers are upset that a solid seat is now in play. “Joni’s campaign is pissed. They should not be in a competitive race,” the source said. ("This is completely false," an Ernst campaign spokesperson said in a statement. "Folks are energized about re-electing Joni Ernst, President Trump and the rest of Republican ballot in Iowa this November.") A Republican strategist close to Mitch McConnell told me that Republicans have Labor Day penciled in as the deadline for Trump to have turned things around. After that, he’s on his own.

Ernst is in a tight race and she can't afford to lose any Trump voters by offending him. Nor can she afford to lose independent voters by appearing to be a Trump lackey-- which is what she is. She's in trouble. She isn't the only Republican in that bind. 8 incumbent senators and dozens of Republican House members are in exactly the same situation.

Probably too far gone to turn things around:

• Martha McSally (AZ)
• Steve Daines (MT)
• Cory Gardner (CO)
• Susan Collins (ME)

And teetering on the brink of political oblivion:

• Joni Ernst (IA)
• Thom Tillis (NC)
• David Perdue (GA)
• Dan Sullivan (AK)

Hardball by Nancy Ohanian

Some districts are so blue or so red that it just doesn't matter what independents think. Take Texas, for example. Mac Thornberry represents TX-13 (the Panhandle) and is leaving office. A good opportunity for Democrats? Not at all. The PVI is R+33. Trump beat Hillary in that district 79.9% to 16.9%. There are more Republicans in the district than Democrats and independents combined. Or look at TX-09 (south Houston). Al Green represents the district, which has a PVI of D+29. Hillary beat Trump there 79.3% to 18.0%. Green is a corporate Democrat with an "F" rating from ProgressivePunch-- but safe as can be in a district with such an overwhelmingly Democratic population. In between TX-09 and TX-13, though are districts that have been gerrymandered to create thinner Republican majorities. Last year two of them flipped from red to blue. This year, more should-- perhaps 4 or 5!-- where Democratic candidates are working hard and smart to take advantage of demographic changes and political changes (read: Trump and Abbott) that are making for more open-minded and fluid electorates.

Wendy Davis is likely to flip TX-21. Gina Ortiz Jones is likely to flip TX-23. Mike Siegel is likely to flip TX-10. Julie Oliver is likely to flip TX-25. In those 4 districts, there are no longer enough Republicans so that someone who looks like a knee-jerk Trump stooge can win but just parroting the White House daily talking points. Having already overwhelmingly won her primary, I asked Oliver how that dynamic is playing out in her central Texas district in terms of the November general election. "People are tired of labels," she told me last night. "And Texans have woken up and seen that with a career politician like Roger Williams, you have someone who is just willing to tie himself to Trump's overt racism and corruption, and put the president and his career before Texas and the district's needs every time."

Let’s Vote For Fair Courts In 2020

-by Marge Baker,
Executive Vice President,
People for the American Way

Even after two months into a national health and economic crisis, Donald Trump and his Republican cronies in the Senate have continued their assault on our federal courts. And while Americans from every walk of life are dealing with the devastating health and economic impact of this pandemic, Senate Republicans are quietly processing more of Trump’s judicial nominees.

People For the American Way has led the charge against Trump’s dangerous judicial nominees since he took office. And in the lead up to the 2020 presidential election, PFAW’s Vote the Courts 2020 campaign has focused on two goals: encouraging presidential candidates to prioritize the importance of the courts in their campaigns and holding senators who vote for Trump’s dangerous troubling judicial nominees accountable for those votes.

Vote the Courts 2020 strives to educate the public about the role that federal judges play in their daily lives-- whether they have access to affordable health care; whether their rights as workers are protected; whether they have the ability to vote and have that vote counted; whether they can be free from discrimination; whether they will have clean air to breathe and clean water to drink. The list is endless and not at all abstract.

During the primary season, we encouraged candidates to address the importance of the courts and share the kinds of judges and justices they would nominate to the bench as president.  Even amid the once-crowded field of contenders, more than a dozen Democratic candidates responded to our call.

Following the campaign launch, PFAW co-sponsored a presidential candidate forum in Iowa that focused on the importance of democracy reform and the courts, where five former candidates spoke in greater detail about their plans to restore balance to our courts.

This issue has become especially salient to progressives in the Trump era: Polling has shown that Democratic voters outrank Republican voters on whether the courts are a reason to support their party’s presidential candidate. In the coming months before Election Day, there is ample opportunity to continue to highlight the importance of fair-minded judges.

And this is relevant not just to the presidency, but also to the senators that vote on these nominees. That’s why another prominent facet of the Vote the Courts 2020 campaign is holding Senators Martha McSally, Cory Gardner, Thom Tillis, Joni Ernst, Susan Collins and David Perdue accountable for their votes to confirm Trump’s dangerous nominees. Working with partners and allies in Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Iowa, Maine and North Carolina, we are highlighting senators’ votes to confirm extreme Trump judges who are hostile to health care, reproductive rights, a healthy environment, democracy and voting rights, and the social safety net through videos, op-eds, and activist toolkits.





In the coming months, we will continue to grow our accountability work, as the same poll cited above also indicates that Democratic voters care more about their senators’ judicial confirmation votes than do Republican voters when weighing their support for a candidate.

Our ability to create products that are integral to our Vote the Court 2020 campaign depends on the work of our stellar legal research team.  In particular, both our Confirmed Judges, Confirmed Fears blog series and web tool provide the information we are using to tie Trump judges’ rulings and dissents to the impact they have on issues critical to our daily lives.

After three and a half years, Trump and his Republican enablers have reshaped our federal judiciary by packing our courts with ultra-conservative judges who give them the green light to enact their extreme agenda. In fact, most Trump appointees are white men who are young enough to spend decades in their lifetime positions on the bench. Long after he vacates office, the damage he has done will endure.

Our rights and liberties-- our right to accessible, affordable health care; our right to make decisions about our bodies; our right to cast a ballot that counts; our right to clean air and water, and more-- are all on the line on Election Day. We need to fight for fair courts, and for judges who understand equality and justice for all of us.

I Cheat All The Time At Golf, Taxes, Wives, Elections And Bathroom Scales-- I'm Not 239 Pounds; I'm 475 Pounds... I Cut The Funding To The CDC, So This Wang Chung Virus Is Really Going To Be Bad

The SNL fantasy trial was good for a laugh, but there is genuine and deep concern among many who have seen the damage Putin-- and Moscow Mitch-- have been able to do to American democracy on the cheap. Philip Rucker attempted to give the true nature of the disaster voice in a report on how Trump's acquittal-- as illegitimate as his presidency-- will change the institution of the presidency, perhaps forever. Republicans might quibble, at least in public, with how Rucker began his report. "The evidence of President Trump’s actions to pressure Ukraine was never in serious dispute. After a systematic presentation of the facts of the case, even some Senate Republicans concluded that what he did was wrong. But neither was the verdict of Trump’s impeachment trial ever in doubt. The Senate’s jurors are scheduled to etch an almost-certain acquittal into the historical record on Wednesday. The impending judgment that the president’s actions do not warrant his removal from office serves as a testament to Washington’s extraordinary partisan divide and to Trump’s uncontested hold on the Republican base. The expected acquittal also has profound and long-term ramifications for America’s institutions and the balance of power between the executive and legislative branches, according to numerous historians and legal experts. In effect, they say, the Senate is lowering the bar for permissible conduct for future presidents." Or at least for presidents of the same same party that controls a Senate that Moscow Mitch has shamelessly turned into a shrivelled appendage of the Executive Branch.

Keep the results from the national polling NBC and the Wall Street Journal released yesterday, namely that majorities of voters believe that Trump abused his power (52-41%) and obstructed Congress (53-37%) and that Trump is trailing the major Democratic presidential candidates in hypothetical matchups for the general election. According to this poll, Biden leads Trump by 6%, Bernie leads him by 4%, Warren by 3% and even Mayo Pete is ahead of him by 1%. And in the generic battle for Congress, Democrats lead Republicans by 6 points (49-43%).

“It’s a dispiriting moment for an American system that in many ways was founded on the insight that, because humankind is frail and fallen and fallible, no one branch of government can have too much power,” said Jon Meacham, an American historian and author. “The president’s party, instead of being a check on an individual’s impulses and ambitions, has become an instrument of them.”

Since the moment House Democrats opened their impeachment inquiry last September, Trump has projected a sense of persecution and self-pity. He called the effort a coup to overthrow him and defraud the results of the 2016 election.

Again and again, Trump proclaimed on Twitter, “READ THE TRANSCRIPT!”-- though the notes from his July 25 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky did not seem to exonerate him. Rather, the notes made plain Trump’s scheme to get Ukraine to open an investigation into former vice president Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden.

With Trump commanding such exceptionally high approval ratings among Republican voters, however, even senators who acknowledged his actions were wrong voted Friday to block new evidence in the trial and pave the way for acquittal.

One of Democrats’ great hopes to permit fresh testimony from firsthand witnesses, including former national security adviser John Bolton, had been Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN), a self-described institutionalist who is retiring and would not have to face the wrath of the GOP’s pro-Trump base.

Yes, one of the Democrats' great hopes... but hopes for what? There were never going to be 20 Republican flips to actually convict Trump. He could hand the deed to Alaska over to Putin in the middle of Fifth Avenue and Dan Sullivan would vote to commend him while Lisa Murkowski just looks on... confused. The Democrats' approach was never really to perform the impossible miracle of persuading the Senate to convict Trump. It was always to persuade the American people Trump shouldn't be reelected in November-- and that neither should the members of his party who backed him. We'll know if they succeeded not on Wednesday, but on election day, 2020. Remember, when Lamar Alexander admitted that Trump’s actions were "inappropriate" and had "already been proven" by House impeachment managers, and that there was "no need for more evidence," he really was helping the Democrats do the job they had set out to do. "Let the people decide," he said.

“This impeachment was a fait accompli at all times,” said Bill Whalen, a fellow at the conservative Hoover Institution at Stanford University. “You talk to congressional Republicans and there’s a feeling that the president is being persecuted, that impeachment was a conviction in search of a crime.”

William A. Galston, chair of the Brookings Institution’s Governance Studies Program, said acquittal “was not only perfectly predictable, but in my judgment, completely inevitable.”

“The United States political scene is as deeply polarized along partisan lines as it has been for at least a century,” Galston added. Noting Trump’s high ratings among Republican voters, he said, “It would take a very brave Republican indeed to break ranks with the president under these circumstances.”

This is not the first instance in which Trump has skirted penalties for wielding the powers of his office for personal or political gain. Former special counsel Robert S. Mueller III found that the president repeatedly worked to block or thwart the Russia investigation, acts to obstruct justice that would have prompted charges were he not a sitting president. But Trump sidestepped any punishment then, just as he appears to now with Ukraine.

One of the president’s lawyers, Alan Dershowitz, proffered a sweeping argument on the floor of the Senate last week that Trump using the powers of his office to pressure Ukraine to open a corruption investigation into the Bidens was not impeachable or illegal because it was done in pursuit of his reelection.

“If a president does something which he believes will help him get elected in the public interest, that cannot be the kind of quid pro quo that results in impeachment,” Dershowitz said during the trial.

In the face of stinging criticism from constitutional scholars and legal experts, Dershowitz said later on Twitter that his comments were being mischaracterized. “A president seeking re-election cannot do anything he wants,” Dershowitz wrote. “He is not above the law.”

Still, Dershowitz’s argument was persuasive for some Republican senators looking for arguments with which to defend Trump irrespective of what the evidence showed.

“Let’s say it’s true, okay? Dershowitz last night explained that if you’re looking at it from a constitutional point of view, that that is not something that is impeachable,” Sen. Mike Braun (R-IN) told reporters.

Timothy Naftali, a historian at New York University and former director of the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, said the arguments advanced on Trump’s behalf in the Senate trial could have lasting consequences for the future of presidential power.

“The Republicans have embraced a theory that permits future abuses of power,” Naftali said. “The outcome of acquittal was predictable... but I’m afraid that this process in the Senate is more enabling of an abusive president than expected.”

The nation’s founders gave Congress oversight responsibilities and powers of impeachment as a check on the executive. Yet, with this week’s likely acquittal of Trump, Meacham argues, the Senate instead has become a tool in the president’s perpetuation of his own power.

“It is not hyperbolic to say that the Republican Party treats Donald Trump more like a king than a president,” Meacham said. “That was a central and consuming anxiety of the framers. It is a remarkable thing to watch the party of Lincoln and Eisenhower and Reagan and the Bushes become an instrument of Donald Trump’s. That’s a massive historical story.”

Late Saturday night, also writing for The Post, Seung Min Kim and Rachael Bade reported how the impeachment trial has solidified Mitt Romney's outlier status among Senate Republicans and how Moscow Mitch was able to manipulate the Republican caucus on behalf of tactics set in the White House for goals set in Moscow. "In the end," the two reporters wrote, "McConnell held his conference together, arguing that witnesses would drag the trial out for weeks and delay other Senate work. Several Republicans acknowledged that the president did use nearly $400 million in military aid to Ukraine as leverage to benefit himself politically, calling it inappropriate, but argued it wasn’t grounds to oust him from office." In the end it was 100% about electoral politics.

Unlike other issues in the Senate, there were no substantive attempts to broker a bipartisan agreement that would cool tensions, ensuring that the impeachment proceedings began-- and ended-- as a near-partisan exercise.

“It has just been a lot harder over the last two weeks to have conversations with Republican friends,” said Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT). “The mood in that room is super tense and super heavy.”

Democrats heavily pressured vulnerable Senate Republicans up for reelection this fall, driving a message declaring any trial without witnesses would be a “coverup.” But GOP senators and aides were confident that voters were paying little attention based on a survey conducted by the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the official campaign arm of Senate Republicans.

“You know, Iowans right now-- honest to God-- they want us to get this thing over with,” said Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA). “They’re like, ‘Why aren’t you doing the business of the American public?’”

In a closed-door party meeting in McConnell’s suite of offices-- where GOP senators have held some of their most consequential strategy sessions-- it was those precise swing-state Republicans like Sens. Cory Gardner (R-CO) and Thom Tillis (R-NC) who said they were prepared to just move on to a final vote without calling additional witnesses.

That was after Bolton’s blockbuster allegation, laid out in an unpublished manuscript of his book as reported by the New York Times, that Trump directly tied the holdup of aid to Ukraine to the political investigations.

The Times report rocked the GOP conference and made Romney believe it increased the likelihood that more Republicans would join in his effort to call Bolton. At a Jan. 27 lunch, Sens. Patrick J. Toomey (R-PA) and Bill Cassidy (R-LA) spoke up about a witness trade, appearing to briefly consider the notion. Romney joined them, making a forceful argument that they had a duty as senators to hear all the relevant evidence.

Moscow Mitch prevailed and today Republican senators are trying to defend their votes to not call witnesses. On Meet the Press yesterday, Lamar Alexander, who-- remember-- is retiring, said Trump's behavior may have been bad but was still not impeachable. Alexander: "I think he shouldn’t have done it. I think it was wrong. Inappropriate was the way I’d say-- improper, crossing the line."

Iowa imbecilic senator, Joni Ernst, who is, rightfully, one of the most vulnerable incumbents in the Senate and who yesterday called for Congress to start impeachment proceedings against Biden immediately if he's elected, was a guest on State of the Union, said that while the call to pressure the president of Ukraine was "Maybe not the perfect call" and that Trump should have used the Department of Justice to talk with him about corruption, she was still planning to vote for acquittal. As if she ever considered voting otherwise! The Senate will be a far better place without Jimi Ernst.

The Worst Of All Possible Worlds For Joni Ernst

2 politicians Ernst should never be near when a camera is around: white nationalists Trump and Steve King

Maybe she was making a play for a bipartisan conservative ticket with Biden-- or maybe she's crazy. But Iowa freshman Senator Joni Ernst (R) looks like she made a classic rookie error this week when she intimated that Social Security benefits had to be cut. First a little background on Iowa, a classic swing state. Despite why the imbecile pundits are all agreed on now-- that Iowa is so red Democrats should not even bother campaigning there, exactly what the abysmal hillary Clinton campaign chose to not do-- Iowa is about the swing very blue (or, at least, very anti-red). Ernst has one chance at reelection: split party voting. Being seen as advocating cutting Social Security is not a way to encourage that. A little recent Iowa electoral history:

2000

• Al Gore- 683,517 (48.54%
• George W. Bush- 634,373 (48.22%)

2004

• George W Bush- 751,957 (49.90%)
• John Kerry- 741,898 (49.23%)

2008

• Barack Obama- 828,940 (53.93%)
• John McCain- 682,379 (44.39%)

2012

• Barack Obama- 822,544 (51.99%)
• Mitt Romney- 730,617 (46.18%)

2016

• Señor Trumpanzee- 800,983 (51.15%)
• Hillary Clinton- 653,669 (41.74%)

All the pundits declared Iowa is so red that it's no longer a swing state, although I don't recall them saying that it was so blue as to be incontestable for Republicans in 2008 when Obama won more overall votes and a bigger percentage of votes than Trump did. Why are they so stupid? And, what's worse, they're still saying that-- to the extent that Biden isn't planning on campaigning or winning there in the general and the only campaign that is prioritizing Iowa after the primaries is Bernie's. What does Bernie know that the others don't? How about that 2018 happened and Iowans gave Trump a huge thumbs down?

There are 4 congressional seats in Iowa and going into the election, the Republicans controlled 3 and the Democrats controlled 1. The Democrats held onto their one seat in 2018, picked up two Republican seats and nearly picked up the 4th one as well! Impressive, but look at the numbers.

In the last midterm election (2014), the Republicans took 595,865 votes statewide (53.19%) and the Democrats took 509,189 (45.45%). In 2018? Turnout grew substantially and Democrats took 664,676 votes (50.48%) while the Republicans won 612,338 votes (46.51%). That doesn't look off the table. It looks like Iowa, Classic Swing State.

Pundits all say Joni Ernst is favored to beat whichever Democrat wins their party's nomination, even though there are two grassroots progressives and a Schumer-picked conservative running. I guess the pundits don't think it matters. Maybe they'll change their minds when Ernst's stupid Social Security comments get out. She said: "So it’s, you know, a broader discussion for another day. But I do think, as various parties and members of Congress, we need to sit down behind closed doors so we’re not being scrutinized by this group or the other, and just have an open and honest conversation about what are some of the ideas that we have for maintaining Social Security in the future."

In Republican-speak that means doing a Grand Bargain that includes cutting benefits for future retirees and raising the retirement age-- something near and dear to the hearts not just of Republicans but also to Joe Biden but out of the question for Bernie and Elizabeth Warren. Ed Kilgore wrote about it for New York Magazine, asserting certainty that "Ernst will claim she didn’t mean what she said, or that the solutions she had in mind might involve giving Social Security beneficiaries more money or Starbucks gift cards. But anyone even vaguely familiar with Republican thinking on 'entitlement reform' knows the drill: The GOP is terrified of intense public hostility to conservative schemes to 'save' Social Security by reducing benefits (usually by privatizing them and then cutting them over time), and needs Democratic 'cover' to get ’er done. But Democrats, you see, are as afraid of doing this as Republicans, which is why it needs to happen in private where those pesky seniors can’t see what’s going on." She's suggested privatizing Social Security before-- and next year would be a very bad year for Iowa voters to be reminded of that, especially if Bernie or Elizabeth are on the top of the ticket vs Trump.

Trump... the guy who has destroyed Iowa's multi-billion dollar soy bean industry and has sent the farm belt into recession. In fact, on Thursday Brendan Cole reported for Newsweek that Iowa corn farmers have had it with Trump not just because of the trade war but for betraying them to oil companies over ethanol.

Corn farmers are now reeling from the move by the Trump administration to drop the requirement for 31 oil refineries to blend ethanol into their fuel.

Using ethanol in fuel was part of the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) policy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Exemptions would normally be granted to smaller refineries experiencing financial hardship. However, it emerged that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had given waivers to oil giants like ExxonMobil and Chevron.

Around 40 percent of the U.S. corn crop is turned into ethanol. Corn farmers, already struggling with five years of low commodity prices and mediocre harvests due to bad weather, say the EPA waivers are another setback.

Two months ago Trump came to Iowa, the country's biggest ethanol producer, to talk up his administration's approval of E15-- gasoline blended with 15 percent ethanol-- which he said would drive up demand for corn in the Midwest.

But opinion against Trump is turning, with the waivers more than canceling out any gains made from the policy.

Nick Bowdish, CEO of Elite Octane in Atlantic, Iowa, backed Trump in 2016 because he was encouraged by the rhetoric about taking on China.

He said: "Since he got himself involved in agricultural policy issues, it has been a complete disappointment to any of us out here in the heartland.

"Where the president went wrong and made a serious misstep was when he made the decision to start destroying the market for agricultural products at home with these refinery waivers," he told Newsweek.

"He added that much more burden to the back of the American farmer at a time when they were already impacted by the trade war with China-- and that's not acceptable.

Trump won 93 out of Iowa's 99 counties in the 2016 presidential race-- the most for a GOP nominee since 1980. The state is also where the 2020 presidential race kicks off, with its caucuses on February 3.

Bowdish said: "So many people out in the Midwest have tended to vote for a conservative Republican candidate and right now, I can't tell you that support is locked up in there for the president."

"There are a lot of independent voters and a lot of moderate Republicans that are weighing their options and listening to what is the rural vision for the other candidates on the ticket," he added.

He said the most efficient ethanol plants in the U.S. are only just breaking even-- the average producer is losing 15 cents a gallon and the most inefficient producers are being forced out of business.

Trump's touting of E15 was greeted with optimism. However, even though it would increase demand for corn by 100 million bushels, this amount pales into insignificance compared with the impact of the refinery waivers, which represent over a billion bushels of corn.

"It is 10 steps backward for one step forward," Bowdish said.

Since Trump took office, the EPA has approved 85 waivers for 4 billion gallons of renewable fuel, ending demand for 1.4 billion bushels of corn.

This evening I spoke with Michael Franken, a progressive taking on Ernst and asked him about Ernst's apparent plans to wreck Social Security. "I think Iowans deserve better than smoky backroom deals and a privatization scheme cooked up by DC politicians like Joni Ernst and Mitch McConnell," he told me. "They gave us a top 1% tax cut in that same smoky room."

Finally-- The End Of Steve King?

Steve King's Iowa district is very, very rural and very, very red. The PVI is R+11 and Trump beat Hillary there 60.9% to 33.5%, significantly outpolling both McCain (50.2%) and Romney (53.4%). Usually King wins in a walk and doesn't even campaign much. This past November, though, he nearly lost, first time candidate and progressive baseball player J.D. Scholten holding him to 50.4%, his smallest win number ever. If only the DCCC hadn't decided J.D. was too progressive for Congress and decided to spend zero on his campaign, while telling national unions and Democratic institutional donors not to give him any money...

I had dinner with J.D. last week and I don't think he's made up his mind about running for the IA-04 House seat again. He may. Or he may run for the Iowa Senate seat currently occupied by Trump-enabler Joni Ernst. Remember, if J.D. could do so well in an R+11 district, how well would he do in an R+3 state with a swingy political history? That said, though, over the weekend, the Des Moines Register noted that even Republicans seem to have had it with King's unbridled racism. And that includes both Ernst and Grassley, both of whom usually support and enable King.

The growing backlash follows an interview with the New York Times earlier this week in which King, who represents Iowa's 4th District, lamented why terms like "white nationalist" and "white supremacist" are offensive.

King attempted to clarify the statements. He issued a release denouncing white nationalism and white supremacy and took to the House floor Friday to address the matter, which he called "a freshman mistake."

But backtracking hasn't slowed the blowback.

"I condemn Rep. Steve King’s comments on white supremacy; they are offensive and racist-- and not representative of our state of Iowa," Sen. Joni Ernst tweeted Saturday. "We are a great nation and this divisiveness is hurting everyone. We cannot continue down this path if we want to continue to be a great nation."

Ernst also linked to a Washington Post op-ed from Sen. Tim Scott in which the South Carolina Republican pulled no punches addressing King's history of racially-charged rhetoric and the lack of action by his party to curb it.

"King’s comments are not conservative views but separate views that should be ridiculed at every turn possible," Scott wrote in the piece.

Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley echoed the remarks from Ernst and Scott on Saturday while speaking with a pair of reporters from Axios.

“I find it offensive to claim white supremacy. I will condemn it," Grassley reportedly said.

Both senators have offered King support in the past or campaigned with him. Shortly before the 2018 election, King released of video of Grassley in which Iowa's senior senator called King an "ally" who he needed in the House.

After the election, Grassley distanced himself from King but did not repudiate him.

Two Iowans this week announced plans to primary King ahead of the 2020 election. One of them, state Sen. Randy Feenstra of Hull, has come out swinging. [Note: Feenstra is an obsessed and deranged homophobic maniac, nearly as bad, in some ways, as King.]

"Our current representative’s caustic nature has left us without a seat at the table," Feenstra said on Twitter. "We don’t need any more sideshows or distractions, we need to start winning for Iowa’s families."

The other Republican challenger, Bret Richards of Irwin, said in an interview with the Des Moines Register about the contrasts between himself and King: “I know who I am. I know I won’t embarrass the state.”

Iowa officials said they were neutral in the potential primary.

Gov. Kim Reynolds issued an ultimatum to King after the election and has said she will stay out of the primary battle but appeared with the Kiron representative during her campaign.

Former 2016 presidential candidate Jeb Bush wrote on Twitter that “Republican leaders must actively support a worthy primary opponent to defeat King because he won’t have the decency to resign.”

Longtime King supporter Bob Vander Plaats, a former Iowa gubernatorial candidate and president of The Family Leader, a conservative political organization, also rebuked the 16-year congressman.

On Face the Nation yesterday, the House Minority's greasy lying Leader, Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), told Margaret Brennan that he will meet with King today to talk with him about his racist problem. McCarthy, of course, can't open his mouth without trying to mislead people-- he is a Republican politician in the age of Trump-- but if you access the interview at the 5:40 mark you'll hear him tap-dancing around what he plans to do about King... almost blaming Pelosi!




UPDATE: McConnell Slams King

Republicans are embarrassed-- and it's a lot less risky to take it out on Steve King than on Señor Trumpanzee. McConnell, the Senate Majority Leader, said there is "no place in the Republican Party, the Congress or the country for an ideology of racial supremacy of any kind... I have no tolerance for such positions and those who espouse these views are not supporters of American ideals and freedoms. Rep. King’s statements are unwelcome and unworthy of his elected position. If he doesn’t understand why 'white supremacy' is offensive, he should find another line of work."

Is There A Lesson To Be Learned About Trump From Pruitt, Manafort And Brazil's Soybean Farmers?

The White House by Nancy Ohanian

The worst-run White House ever? You bet! Just ask Susan Glasser at the New Yorker. She wrote about "The Trump Unchained era," in which Señor T has "effectively unleashed himself from the strictures, processes, and constraints that Kelly" and every other aide has "sought to impose on him... not even a brusque Marine general with a chest full of medals, is going to bring order" to a psychopath illegitimate occupant of the White House determined to have his own way, no matter who gets hurt. "It’s now clear that Trump is making major decisions without even a nod to the process and order that Kelly was supposedly bringing to his office; no one pretends that major moves, such as the risky nuclear summit with North Korea or recent conflicts with Congress over immigration and the budget, are the result of anything other than [Trumpanzee's] own spur-of-the-moment strategizing... Turnover among the White House staff, already record-setting in Trump’s first year, has spiked recently, now that no one is really in charge."

Of course, not everyone gets hurt by all this. Sure, here in the U.S. soybean farmers in Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, North Dakota, Indiana, Missouri, Ohio, South Dakota and Arkansas are going bankrupt-- all in counties that voted overwhelmingly for Trump-- but some soybean farmers are rolling in cash already-- in Brazil. "Soybean prices in the U.S. and Brazil, the nations that account for roughly 80 percent of global exports, have taken drastically different paths thanks to Donald Trump’s trade war. In the U.S., average cash prices fell to about $7.79 a bushel this week, the lowest in almost a decade, according to an index compiled by the Minneapolis Grain Exchange. China’s tariffs on American goods including farm products have now taken effect after the U.S. implemented a raft of duties earlier in the day Friday and President Trump threatened more action. Meanwhile in Brazil, exporters have been handed high times. Soybeans to be loaded in August at the nation’s Paranagua port fetched $2.21 a bushel more than Chicago futures as of Friday, the widest gap since data starts in 2014. The premium has more than tripled since the end of May."

The Brazilian farmers didn't vote for Trump. I wonder if the ones in Iowa and Minnesota will in 2020-- or even for Trump enablers in Congress in November. Let's take Minnesota. There are almost no places in the entire country where the Republicans have any shots to win Democratic-held seats, but soybean country in the southern and western parts of the state include the 5 counties with the most soybean output, homes of Tim Walz (MN-01), who is retiring, and Colin Peterson (MN-07), a Blue Dog who's always on shaky ground. The soybean counties being economically battered in the two districts all went overwhelming for Trump

• Polk- 61.1% to 32.1%
• Redwood- 67.9% to 24.9%
• Renville- 64.7% to 28.0%
• Marshall- 66.9% to 25.6%
• Fairbault- 63.3% to 29.3%

It doesn't get any redder than that in Minnesota. Republicans have been hoping to win the seat-- even in a blue wave cycle-- with Jim Hagedorn, who's raised $610,804. The DCCC is betting on Dan Feehan (a New Dem) to hold the seat and they put him on their Red-to-Blue list. Even if the soybean counties in his district don't flip blue-- they won't-- but decrease the Republican totals or turnout by a few percentage points, Feehan beats Hagedorn and R+5 district stays blue. Peterson's district is even redder-- R+12, the reddest district held by a Democrat in the country. Peterson votes with the GOP most of the time and the NRCC isn't targeting him. Still, Republican candidate Dave Hughes thought he had a shot this cycle. Not with the catastrophe for the soybean farmers, who tend to like Peterson, the ranking Democrat on the House Agriculture Committee, anyway. Tragic for the Republicans, who have been hoping to do some damage to the Democrats in Minnesota, especially in the soybean counties that went so overwhelming for Trump. Pity.

It's a somewhat similar story in Iowa, except the two Republicans with the big soybean counties, Steve King and David Young, are playing defense. Again, every soybean county is blood red... but the farmers know who to blame for their economic woes-- Trump and his two rubber-stamps in the House.

• Plymouth- 74.0% to 22.0%
• Kossuth- 66.3% to 26.0%
• Pottawattamie- 57.9% to 36.3%
• Sioux- 82.1% to 12.7%
• Woodbury- 57.4% to 37.5%

King is so sure of himself that he forgot to raise any money. As of the May 16 FEC filing deadline he had raised $438,873 and had just $87,250 in cash on hand. The progressive grassroots Democrat in the race, former local baseball player, J.D. Scholten, outraised him ($492,188) and had $195,348 cash on hand. The DCCC is ignoring the race, of course, but Blue America endorsed J.D. and you can help him oust Steve King by clicking-- and contributing-- on the ActBlue 2018 congressional thermometer on the right. JD is trying to flip those soybean counties, but he doesn't have to, to beat King district-wide. Again, if enough Republicans vote for him (about 20%) in the counties Trump's trade war is hurting most-- or even just stay home in disgust-- say goodbye to one of Congress' worst racists and neo-fascists and hello to the guy who will shake up Iowa politics big time.

Yesterday, JD sent this statement to his supporters in Iowa and to the media: "The Administration's devastating and ill-advised trade war with China today could be costing already-suffering Iowa farmers up to $624 million. While Steve King has spent the past week tweeting about Mexico and Denmark, he has shown no such concern about the looming crisis here in Northwest Iowa as farmers are suffering from 10-year record low soybean prices and have seen their incomes decline by 75% since 2012. It's time for change and for a Congressman that will stand up for Iowans and put the needs of the 4th District first."

Have congressional Republicans finally found an issue they can stand up to Trump on? They're certainly grumbling about his trade war agenda. This week Politico reported that "not a party meeting goes by these days where multiple Republicans don’t vent that the president isn’t listening to them-- and plot how to fight back... The mounting frustration with the Republican president is a warning sign for the party amid what’s been a surprisingly favorable stretch... Republican senators say they can’t get the president to comprehend that his tariffs offensive could upend all of that progress in short order. Commodity prices in the heartland are sagging, U.S. allies are retaliating with tariffs of their own-- and GOP leaders are fretting that the booming economy is about to go into a pre-midterms nosedive."

Iowa Senator Joni Ernst is pretty typical-- too scared to take Trump on. She refuses to back a GOP bill to restrict Trump’s autonomy on trade, "preferring instead to write the president letters and lobby him privately. But she said her state is hurting because of retaliatory tariffs aimed at agriculture industries. And Iowans are running out of patience. 'We want to support the president; my constituents want to support the president as well. But they can only keep that stiff upper lip before things collapse. We’re not quite at that point, but it’s rapidly approaching.'" She's dreaming. Trump's favoirabilty in Iowa collapsed even before his trade war started hurting farmers-- from a positive 9 point net favorability after he moved into the White House, to a current minus 7-- a dire 16 point drop. Square that with what Scholten had to say above.

Let's back up a little... what kind of a person would even take a job working for someone like Trump? The same kind of people who took jobs working for Hitler, for Franco, for Mussolini... There are always accomplices looking out for themselves. They're never top notch people, of course, but there are lots of them. One Republican who ran in the other direction was Rick Wilson, a conservative Republican who recognized exactly what Trump is at the same time most normal people did. Not long ago he quit to GOP. A couple days ago he penned a piece for the Daily Beast, Scott Pruitt Wasn’t Corrupt Enough for Trumpistan. "Trump," he wrote, "is unequivocal proof that As hire Bs and Bs hire Cs, and Trump hires people without the judgment, qualifications, ethical foundations, and moral stature to run an underground bum-fighting operation. Scott Pruitt’s obvious money problems should have screamed out in any background check, to say nothing of a Senate confirmation hearing. Pruitt is a man, like so many of Trump’s claque of low-rent hoodlums, bus-station conmen, edge-case dead-enders, and caged-immigrant child porn aficionados, utterly unsuited to a role of public trust and responsibility... Pruitt didn’t get fired because he was an utterly corrupt grifter. Pruitt got fired because he was clumsy enough to give away the game and embarrass a different utterly corrupt grifter. To the detriment of the country, Pruitt is just one of Trump’s many minions who model their low behavior, raving contempt for the law, and disregard for even the sparest ethical standards and shamelessly follow the lead of the Grifter in Chief." BINGO! How is it so many people still don't see it? Is Robert Mueller's report really going to be the unicorn of impeachment-- or even change a few minds here and there?

The Scott Pruitt fiasco could only have ended one way: not with a bang but a simper, a wet fart of a resignation that exposed three Big Lies of the Trump world.

First, the image of Trump and his squad as hard-bargaining, brutal street fighters who never give in and always punch back twice as hard sure didn’t hold up. Pruitt isn’t even under FBI investigation, which is more than many of President Trump’s compatriots can say.

Second, it exposed the lie that Republicans in Congress are anything more than Trump’s enablers. The vast majority of Republicans in Washington know this administration is lavishly corrupt. They’re not stupid; it’s driven home every time they walk through the doors of Trump’s hotel or watch Jared Kushner trawling foreign satraps for cash like some 4 a.m. lot lizard at a truck stop.

Pruitt represented a perfect opportunity for these Vichy Republicans to buy some daylight from both the grand and petite corruptions of the Trump administration that fill D.C. to the scuppers. In a sinking ship of state awash with “Yeah, but…” rationalizations, excuses, and muttered denials, Pruitt’s lavish, third world kleptocratic behavior gave them every chance to do the right thing, so of course, by and large, they didn’t, couldn’t, or wouldn’t.

As with all things Trump, there’s always an excuse, no matter how thin. In conversations with elected officials and activists in the past few weeks, there was a gushing approval for what Pruitt was doing on the policy front, and feigned ignorance of everything else. That Pruitt was a man of such petty, grubby behaviors wasn’t a deep, dark secret. Many Republicans now have egg on their faces for sitting quietly and waiting for Trump to do the right thing.

Finally, as if America needed reminding, Trump’s promises to hire the best people to drain the swamp and Make America Great Again are all not only false but ludicrously so.

Like Trump, the Doctor Evil of presidents, finally found his EPA chief’s behavior had reached a point of rapidly diminishing returns. Lights and sirens? Ritz-Carlton hand lotion? Custom pens? Running government staffers as if they were the servant of some particularly self-indulgent generalissimo? Chick-fil-A franchises?

Shame about Trump's former campaign manager, Putin lackey Paul Manafort, rotting in prison-- in solitary confinement 23 hours a day for his own protection. Eventually we'll have to build a separate penitentiary for Trump and his entire Regime-- a large, remote one... possibly on one of Alaska's 2,670 islands, maybe on Afognak, 5 miles north of Kodiak, Афогнакъ in Russian, or on the outskirts of Petersburg (population 2,948) on tiny Mitkof Island, named for Tsarist Admiral Prokofy Mitkov.

Has Scott Pruitt Already Caught Up With Betsy DeVos As The Worst In Trumpanzee's Cabinet?

Forget about Pruitt using his influence-- and an EPA employee-- to buy a used mattress from a Trump hotel (notorious for bed-bugs) and as a realtor. And forget about Pruitt using an aide to find "a business opportunity" for his wife with Chick-fil-A. And, yes, it was a different EPA staffer from the one looking at the used mattresses. The Washington Post did report that "Pruitt’s efforts on his wife’s behalf-- revealed in emails recently released under a Freedom of Information Act request by the Sierra Club-- did not end with Chick-fil-A. Pruitt also approached the chief executive of Concordia, a New York nonprofit organization. The executive, Matthew Swift, said he ultimately paid Marlyn Pruitt $2,000 plus travel expenses to help organize the group’s annual conference last September."

I'm guessing that all this what called Iowa Senator Joni Ernst (R) to call Pruitt "about as swampy as you get here in Washington, D.C., and if the president wants to drain the swamp, he needs to take a look at his own cabinet."

Pruitt’s tenure at the Environmental Protection Agency is under intensifying scrutiny, with at least 10 federal investigations probing his $50-per-night rental of a bedroom in a Capitol Hill condominium from a lobbyist, his frequent taxpayer-funded travel and his spending decisions.

...Ernst said she was frustrated with Pruitt’s handling of the U.S. biofuel mandate, arguing that he is undermining President Donald Trump’s campaign commitment to support ethanol.

“Mr. Pruitt is breaking our president’s promises to farmers,” Ernst said at the Platts Energy Podium in Washington. Maybe at some point Trump “will say it’s time for you to go, but that is up to the president.”

With someone “going against the campaign promises that are made,” Ernst added, “I don’t know how long that relationship can last.”

The comments from Ernst coincided with sharp words from her fellow Iowa Republican, Senator Chuck Grassley, who told reporters in a conference call on Tuesday that Pruitt “has betrayed the president.”

Neither went as far as calling for Pruitt’s resignation. Grassley said he would reserve judgment until after he’s reviewed a forthcoming White House outline of planned biofuel policy changes.

Trump administration officials are slated to detail those policy changes following weeks of negotiations by the Agriculture Department and the EPA, including a plan to lift summertime restrictions on the sale of a higher ethanol gasoline blend known as E15. But that outline has been delayed for weeks amid sharp disagreements over the possible changes.

Farm-state lawmakers have blasted the EPA’s moves to more liberally waive small refiners from annual biofuel blending quotas, following a federal court decision last year. Ernst said she was also frustrated Pruitt was pursuing a change that could allow exported biofuel to count toward compliance with the domestic blending mandates, after rejecting the idea in a letter to her last year.

Farmers nationwide rallied behind Trump during his 2016 presidential campaign, forming part of the rural-voter bedrock that put him in the White House. But fissures in that rural support have developed over biofuels and trade initiatives that threaten agricultural exports.

“Right now, support is wavering in Iowa; people are really worried,” Ernst said. The White House’s planned biofuel policy changes “could further destroy our corn and biofuels demand, and at a time when our farmers are hurting.”

And, of course, it isn't just Republicans criticizing Pruitt. This morning Omaha Democratic candidate Kara Eastman told us that "Our children are our most valuable resources. As someone who has been fighting to ensure all children have access to safe and healthy homes that are free from toxics such as lead, mold and radon, I have seen the impacts that solid EPA programs can have in communities like Omaha. Mr. Pruitt is not only unethical in his business practices, but a poor choice as a leader when it comes to protecting our kids. We simply deserve better."

Tom Guild, the progressive candidate for the Oklahoma City seat (OK-05) was aware of the Pruitt dangers before most of us. And Pruitt's employment in the Trump cabinet hasn't made him feel any better about him. Guild: "Scott Pruitt is an embarrassment to the state of Oklahoma and America. He feeds on the sewer water beneath the streets of the nation’s capital. He is involved in so many scandals and ethics probes, it is nearly impossible to follow the bouncing ball. Draining the swamp is a bad joke as long as Pruitt holds high office at the EPA. It’s bad enough that he is charting a course to do permanent and irreversible damage to America and Planet Earth, but he is also lacking in integrity, common sense, good judgment, and scruples. Thinking of Pruitt automatically initiates my gag reflex. If there is anyone who epitomizes the worst excesses and screaming hubris of our national government, Pruitt takes the prize. He needs to lift up the rock he was hiding under, go back into hiding, and stay there. He doesn’t have the sense God gave a peanut (with apologies to members of the peanut family.) I’ve run out of adjectives and nouns to describe his behavior and persona. Now we know why some wild animals devour their young!"