Marianne Williamson Draws A Line In The Sand-- For Shahid Buttar And For David Kim

A few weeks ago Marianne Williamson wanted to discuss the congressional election in CA-34, a district that starts a few blocks from my house. I can walk there; before the new reality, I used to have dinner there a couple of times a week. And Konbi, my favorite sandwich shop-- also, according to Bon Appétit, the best sandwich shop in America-- is in the district. CA-34 includes Echo Park, Eagle Rock, Highland Park, Koreatown, Mount Washington, El Serano, Cypress Park, Boyle Heights, DTLA (the Arts District, the Financial District, the Fashion District), Dodger Stadium, City Terrace, Chinatown, Bunker Hill, Little Tokyo, Newton Park and Skid Row. It borders on Adam Schiff's district, Ted Lieu's district, Judy Chu's district, Karen Bass' district and Lucille Roybal-Allard's district. It's the heart of Los Angeles.

The district is 64% Hispanic, 20% Asian and 10% white. The $40,215 median income makes it one of the 20 poorest congressional districts in the country. It's one of the bluest districts in the country (D+35), gave Romney 14% of the vote and Trump 11%. It was the only district in Los Angeles to give Bernie a majority in the 2016 primary. The congressman representing CA-34 is Jimmy Gomez. Progressive Punch rates his voting record-- the 16th most progressive-- a solid "A." The only Californians voting further left are Mark DeSaulnier, Judy Chu and Ro Khanna. Gomez's #16 compares well to actual heroes of the revolution like AOC and Rashida Tlaib (tied at #18), Barbara Lee (#22) and Ilhan Omar (#37). But Marianne wasn't calling me to discuss endorsing Gomez's reelection campaign. She knows the meaninglessness of these kinds of ratings and wanted to know what I thought of David Kim, Gomez's opponent.

David's a 36 year old anti-corruption attorney whose campaign motto is "Financial Freedom, Love & Justice for All" The jungle primary was March 3 and the two who emerged to face off in November were Gomez with 49.5% of the vote (just under 50) and David Kim with 23.2% of the vote. Turnout was abysmal-- 34,034 voters in total. After the vote, the other 3 candidates (including the Republican) all endorsed David Kim. This video will give you a good idea about what his campaign is all about and why he has been gaining momentum:





I asked him how he's going to persuade voters to replace Gomez and he told me that Gomez isn't "a true progressive and does the bare minimum, only chiming in to support certain legislation once Nancy Pelosi does so first. He is scared to lead in legislation and just follows. If he were a true progressive, he should be supporting Ilhan Omar's HR 6515 and not HR 6314 in place of that. Moreover, Jimmy doesnt have a pulse with the suffering of our people here in L.A. I have nothing personal against him but when career politicians have been in office too long, they're unable to connect with the suffering of the people no matter how hard they try because they've been in their political cash bubbles for so long... [W]e need a federal representative who will fight and lead for us, not do everything Nancy says. We have corrupt local politician/developer relationships/money rampant in L.A. and our federal representative hasn't stepped in because they're all part of the same pack, with the same campaign donors... 98.8% of Jimmy's campaign contributions are from PACs, corporate PACs, banks, developers, military industrial complex/defense, etc.. And our people in L.A. don't like that kind of energy feeding our federal representative. We want to move away from a Jimmy Gomez [towards someone more like] Ro Khanna. We need someone to take a firm stance on clean campaign finance reform, while addressing homelessness, housing and these systemic issues that haven't been addressed for years... Nothing personal against Jimmy. But people are suffering and we don't want to waste another 2 years by electing someone who just follows."

Marianne endorsed him. That was a big step towards a kind of political clarity that differentiates between real leadership and... well, however you want to describe professional politicians who try to be on the right side of their districts' prevailing sentiments.

Marianne was just getting started though. She asked me about the grassroots progressive taking on Nancy Pelosi, Shahid Buttar, which began a process that led to the video up top. As she noted, she's "a lifelong Democrat who has become has become very very concerned with the corporatist direction of the party in too many cases." Her own experience in running for president this year showed her, she said, "how the control of certain forces, at the expense of progressive voices, is a direction that is taking the Democratic Party away from the principles" that she was-- like many of us-- raised to believe the party stands for. The Heroes Act Pelosi pushed through Congress on Friday snapped something in Marianne. She is insisting that there should be $2,000 a month for everyone until the pandemic is under control, as well as Medicare for All... "We need a show of compassion for the American people that is simply not the agenda these days for the corporate-backed Democratic Party."

"Progressives," she said, "can't just be sidelined all the time... or pandered to, suppressed. It's got to stop. Let's stop it now. ShahidButtar.com." Please take a look at the candidates Marianne has already endorsed by clicking on the thermometer on the right. And don't be surprised if she gets behind others taking on the Ancien Régime beyond just Nancy Pelosi, Steny Hoyer, Mitch McConnell, Carolyn Maloney, Gregory Meeks, Albio Sires and Susan Collins. I wouldn't be surprised if, for example, Debbie Wasserman Schultz doesn't find herself with a Marianne Williamson problem down in Broward and Miami-Dade counties in the not too distant future. Meanwhile, please take a look at the candidates, like David Kim, Shahid Buttar, Mckayla Wilkes, Andrew Romanoff and Betsy Sweet, who Marianne has already endorsed. And please contribute what you can to their campaigns at the page the thermometer will take you to.

Primaries Are A Healthy Component Of Democracy But... Some Are More Crucial, In Effect, Than Others

Frances Motiwalla

The district right next door to mine, CA-34, includes Angelino Heights, Eagle Rock, Highland Park, El Sereno, Koreatown, Lincoln Hights, Boyle Heights, the Arts District, Chinatown, City Terrace... I'll tell you how great this district is. It's the only district in Los Angeles where Bernie beat Hillary in 2016. It's a young, vibrant, bustling district, alive with immigrants working to make a better life for themselves and their families. The district is 65% Latino and 20% Asian and the PVI is D+35. Trump won just 10.7% of the vote there.

In 2017 there was a special election to replace Xavier Becerra, who was reelected Attorney General and Blue America helped elect state Assemblyman Jimmy Gomez. He beat a more conservative Democrat, Robert Lee Ahn, in a very low turnout race-- 25,569 (59.2%) to 17,610 (40.8%). Gomez has been a bit of a disappointment in Congress. He takes dirty money and hangs back on important congressional activities. In the end, he pretty much always votes right but anyone who was looking for a leader from the most cutting edge district in Southern California (as we were) is disappointed. ProgressivePunch rates him an "A" and his lifetime crucial vote score is a hearty 95.14%-- right between Barbara Lee and Jerry Nadler. Hard to ask for anything better... except for some leadership. He always seems to hang back. He gets behind things like the Green New Deal and Medicare-For-All after everyone else has. He's not what we expected when we backed him-- no real regrets, but... Wouldn't it be great to have someone like AOC or Rashida Tlaib? The district can easily support that kind of leader.

So it was exciting this week to hear from a young activist, Frances Motiwalla, who is seriously considering primarying Gomez. I went to meet her over the weekend. Definitely AOC material, no question about it.

We'll come back to Jimmy and Frances sooner or later, but what I want to talk about now is something that Marie Newman, the progressive Democrat primarying Blue Dog Dan Lipinski in Chicagoland for the second consecutive cycle reminded me about over the weekend. She told me on Sunday, "alignment with your district is everything. If current incumbents are not in alignment, yes they should be primaried for sure. However, if an incumbent is still in strong alignment and producing proactive ideas, we should not be primarying just to do it. As a party, we need to work with focus and clarity."

I think primaries in general are healthy for democracy and I still agree with Marie and think there should be some kind of prioritization for organizations who work in the field. Yesterday I spent a lot of time on the phone with a super-progressive mayor in Milwaukie, Oregon, Mark Gamba. Mark, a full-on Berniecrat with a stellar record of accomplishment to prove it, is primarying one of the most venal Blue Dogs in the House, Kurt Schrader. How much more important is it to steer all the help we can to Gamba, while taking a back seat when it comes to races launched against incumbents who are merely... disappointing.

Yesterday a Chicago attorney, Andrew Heldut, popped up out of nowhere to say he's primarying one of the most effective progressives in the House, Jan Schakowsky. She's been a great member for her constituents (and for the country). I can't wait to see what kind of case Heldut makes. So far it was just that she's old and it's time for new leadership and that he's Polish-American. I doubt that'll fly in Schakowsky's district-- which goes from Lincoln Park through Evanston and Wilmette up to Winnetka and then west as far as Morton Grove, Des Plaines and Arlington Heights. That race hasn't moved me yet-- not the way Gamba's and Newman's have. And it isn't as intriguing as Motiwalla's either.

I noticed that Sunday USMC colonel (ret) and Iraq War veteran Sheila Bryant, an attorney launched a primary challenge against New Dem Anthony Brown, pointing out that he's detached from his job and just using it as stepping stone for a second run for governor in 2022. ProgressivePunch gives him a "D" grade-- far from acceptable in a district with a PVI of D+28 and where Hillary beat Trump 77.2% to 19.7%. So we'll look into Ms. Bryant and see if how much better a Rep. she would be. Like Brown, she's a Harvard graduate and a Bronze Star recipient. Her activism has been mostly in the field of criminal justice reform and is also running on affordable housing and healthcare. She made a good case for challenging him: "Anthony Brown doesn’t understand the tremendous urgency of now. Our president is out of control, our country is not dealing with our problems, and we need leadership that is ready to speak up, speak out and make a difference, not just show up to vote and call it a week. The country is falling apart, and Anthony Brown is treating Congress like it’s his nine-to-five, all while hoping he can use this as a stepping stone for the governorship. Congress is not a day job-- it’s a calling, and that’s why I’m running for this seat."

And then yesterday, Eric Swalwell decided to stop messing around with a pointless presidential "run" and get back home to the East Bay and see if Hayward, Dublin. Pleasanton, Union City and Livermore voters are still with him. While he wasn't minding the store, Aisha Wahab, a member of the Hayward City Council, decided to run. She has quite a following among activists and he may be in for a real fight. She's a lot more progressive than he is, with his ProgressivePunch lifetime crucial vote rating of "D."

Can Young Latino Voters Power Bernie To A Win In California?

CA-34 in Los Angeles is the district next door and to the east and south of mine. I'm there a lot; it's basically down the street. It includes Angelino Heights, Mount Washington, Eagle Rock, Highland Park, City Terrace, Boyle Heights, the Arts District, the Financial District and Koreatown. Long a magnetic for immigrants, it's ranked as among the 20 poorest congressional districts in America, but much of it is rapidly gentrifying and it's one of L.A.'s most energetic and entrepreneurial areas. The district is 64.8% Latino, 19.4% Asian, 10% white and 4% Black. It's basically a Republican-free zone and one of the bluest congressional districts in the country-- Trump only took 10.7% of the vote there and the PVI is R+35.

The congressman is Jimmy Gomez, who was reelected in 2018 with 72.5% of the vote (against a Green; the GOP doesn't run candidates in CA-34). Discounting the freshmen, ProgressivePunch ranks Gomez's voting record as the 14th most progressive in the House-- perfectly in sync with his constituents. A member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, an original co-sponsor of Pramila Jayapal's new-and-improved Medicare-For-All bill, an original co-sponsor of AOC's Green New Deal resolution and an original co-sponsor of Bobby Scott's $15 minimum wage bill, Gomez is unquestionably progressive... but not a radical. He's a union organizer and an immigration activist, not really an outright socialist.

In 2016 Hillary won L.A. County and almost every congressional district. Mine gets counted as a 49.6-49.6% tie, but in reality, Hillary managed to beat Bernie by 67 votes-- 65,975 to 65,908. There was one district that Bernie won though-- CA-34. He took 49,121 (51.3%) votes to her 45,763 (47.7%). Ironically, the only other L.A.-area congressional district Bernie won, is fully in Orange County, CA-46, where Latinos are also a majority. The local congressman, though, Lou Correa, is a co-chair of the reactionary Blue Dog coalition and has a miserable voting record-- rated a solid "F" by ProgressivePunch, beryls much unlike Gomez's solid "A." Bernie beat Hillary there 34,347 (50.4%) to 33,214 (48.8%).

Gomez was first elected in a 2017 special right after Bernie took the district. Polling by Latino Decisions found that 72% of likely primary voters in the district said "a Sanders endorsement would make them more likely to consider voting for a candidate-- the highest mark of any potential endorser... It wasn’t just Sanders name, but many of the themes from his political movement that voters in CA-34 also supported... 51% want a candidate who thinks the Democratic party needs fundamental reform versus 33% who like the idea of candidate who represents the California Democratic establishment. And by a 53% to 34% margin the voters in the district thought Bernie would have defeated Trump last November."

Younger Latino voters (18-30 years old) are among the best-informed and most ideologically progressive voters in California. And they are a strong bulwark for Bernie's campaign. On Saturday Aida Chavez, in a post for The Intercept, Bernie Sanders Is The Most Popular 2020 Candidate Among Hispanic Voters, New Polling Finds, reported that Bernie "is leading every other presidential candidate in support from Hispanic voters, who make up a significant chunk of his base... Sustaining this support will be critical to Sanders’s shot at the Democratic nomination, as Latinx voters will be the largest racial or ethnic minority group in the electorate by 2020, and wield greater influence over the outcome of the nomination than in previous elections due to changes in the primary calendar." She bases her conclusions on a new poll from Morning Consult.

At this point, Bernie has 33% of the Latino vote and even more among Latinos 30 and younger. The only other candidate with strong Latino support is Biden (24%). Beto does well, with 13% of the Hispanic vote. But Julián Castro clocks in at just 4%.

Just six states hold about 71 percent of eligible Hispanic voters, including 7.7 million who live in California, 5.4 million who live in Texas, and 3 million in Florida, all of which are early primary states. Hispanic people overall are on track to account for more than 13 percent of eligible voters-- slightly more than the share of black voters, according to a report from the Pew Research Center. In the 2018 midterms, about 43.5 percent of all Hispanic eligible voters were 18 to 35 years old, compared with 30.6 percent of all eligible voters.

Super Tuesday, which will fall on March 3, 2020, will include California and Texas, two delegate-rich states that also happen to have the largest Latinx populations in the country. (As recently as 2016, California held its presidential primary in June.) Then on March 17, Democratic candidates will face sizable Hispanic populations in Arizona, Florida, and Illinois. In Nevada, where roughly 28 percent of its population is Hispanic, will hold its caucus in late February, will expand in-person early voting to four days next year.

The latest Economist/YouGov poll also found Sanders leading among Hispanic voters, with 56 percent saying that they are considering voting for him in the primary or caucus in their state. Forty-two percent said they are considering voting for Biden, 35 percent for O’Rourke, 29 percent for Harris, and 23 percent for Warren.

Why Jimmy Gomez's Victory In CA-34 Was A BFD

Tuesday night Jimmy Gomez became the first Democrat to win a House seat since Trump was elected president. He won pretty overwhelmingly-- 60-40%-- in a deep blue Los Angeles district. Generally Republicans don't even try in districts like CA-34. The jungle primary, in fact, resulted in 2 candidates with "D" next to their names facing off this week in the general election. One was Gomez-- a nose-to-the-grindstone progressive Assemblyman and proven, recognized champion of working families. The other was a wealthy, conservative "ex"-Republican, Robert Lee Ahn, who was backed by prominent Republicans and flagrantly campaigned for GOP votes.

It didn't work out for Ahn. He spent $498,400 of his own money ($1,372,545 in total) on the race and appealed strictly along ethnic lines to fellow Koreans, the second biggest ethnic group in the district. Korean-American turnout was very high, but not high enough, especially when Republicans wound up not turning out, just staying home-- a warning to other Democrats around the country who think this is a viable strategy for career advancement.

When Gomez declared for the seat, he was not favored to win. The establishment was already getting behind a far better known and more senior political leader, former Assembly Speaker John Pérez... and Gomez was viewed as the "too far left" interloper. "Too far left" is a weird idea in the only congressional district in Los Angeles where Bernie beat Hillary-- a a district that Democrats regularly win with over 80% of the vote. Blue America was the first group to urge Gomez to run and the first group that endorsed him when he decided to. And the reason we did is the same reason, essentially, he was able to win the primary (among two dozen candidates!) and then win the general on Tuesday. The magic formula? To be honest, there are two pieces of this: his record and his campaign.

Forget about the Republican stooge and his incoherent conservativism. In the primary, several candidates tried running to Gomez's left based on two things: basically meaningless utopian promises and the fact that each had licked envelopes in Bernie's campaign. What Gomez had to offer instead-- aside from a robust record on constituent services-- was an admirable and inspiring list of actual progressive accomplishments. So not just a good voting record but actual accomplishments. He co-wrote the state's Medicare-for-All bill. He wrote and passed a Paid Family Leave bill that fixed flawed legislation that saw virtually all the benefits going to women making over $80,000 and none going to the women who most needed it. His approach is now the national model. He conceptualized, wrote and passed-- in a bipartisan manner-- a green energy bill that didn't just subsidize wealthy Tesla buyers and people putting expensive solar panel arrays on their roofs, but also working class communities. Talk is cheap. A record of accomplishment like Gomez's goes way beyond talk.

As for the campaign... Monday a contact at the DCCC was trying to sell me on their new DCCC University-- "better," he told me, "than Trump University." Ha, ha. DCCC U is supposed to train campaign operatives. "There are less than 30 competent campaign managers in the whole country," he told me. That's true, although I didn't mention that the DCCC has been turning out scores of incompetent ones for at least a decade. But the point is that Gomez was lucky enough to snare one of the 30: David Keith.

Keith had just finished a successful Assembly campaign for Eloise Reyes, beating a corrupt conservative Democratic incumbent, Chevron Cheryl-- no one even remembered her name after Keith tarred her with that monicker. He knows how to win races, not by following the flawed one-corrupt-size-fits-all DCCC playbook but by eschewing expensive and ineffective TV ads that do nothing but make consultants very very wealthy, instead putting together the kinds of field operations and GOTV efforts that crooked organizations like the DCCC and EMILY's List hate (since they can't use them to rake off any dough for themselves through commissions). Today top Washington Democratic Party officials are begging him to fly to Washington to "debrief" them on how to win races. He laughed. Rumors are running wild that he was packing his bags to fly to Racine, Wisconsin... where some say he plans to spend the next 17 months helping Randy Bryce beat Paul Ryan.

"I've been asked to work on a couple of Senate races and some interesting House campaigns here in beautiful sunny California," he told me this morning. "But repealing and replacing Paul Ryan with @IronStache... is something any red blooded, patriotic American would have to give real consideration to. You know how much I love my mother and this great country... Any idea what the weather is like in Racine," he asked earnestly.

CA-34 Special Election Primary Results-- A Progressive Will Face Another So-Called "Ex"-Republican

Yesterday, as expected, progressive Democratic Assemblyman Jimmy Gomez came out far ahead of any of the other 23 candidates in the first round of the congressional contest to replace Xavier Becerra. CA-34 in an overwhelmingly Hispanic district entirely within the confines of Los Angeles. It goes from Eagle Rock. Highland Park, Mount Washington Cypress Park and El Sereno down to Chinatown, Downtown L.A., City Terrace, Boyle Heights and Koreatown. It's a rapidly gentrifying district that is overwhelmingly Hispanic (67%) and Asian (19%). The two most popular politicians in the area, L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti and now-Attorney General Xavier Becerra both endorsed Gomez, who was the only candidate running who could point to a substantive record of genuine accomplishment. Only 29,407 people voted (out of 304,905 registered voters), probably because many people felt it was a safely blue seat.

And it is safely blue-- at least technically. Obama beat McCain 79% to 18% and then beat Romney 83% to 14%. Hillary did even better, eviscerating the intensely hated Trump 83.6% to 10.7%. No one remembers when a serious Republican congressional candidate was fielded in the area. But what happens in districts like these-- and what happened this time-- is that big Republican money (developers, charter school predators, etc) finance conservative fake Democrats.

The actual Republican running, William Morrison came in a distant 8th with 1,089 votes (3.8%). But the candidate who came in second, ostensibly a Democrat, Robert Ahn, was a wealthy, opportunistic Republican switched parties a couple of years ago to better position himself for elective office. He raised a whopping $338,702 and loaned himself another $295,000. His campaign was strictly one of stoking ethnic solidarity in Koreatown. His message of working cooperatively with Trump isn't one that gained any traction whatsoever.

A dozen candidates-- half the field-- scored more than 2% of the votes:

• Jimmy Gomez (D)- 10,704 (26.54%)
• Robert Ahn ("ex"-R)- 7,543 (18.70%)
• Maria Cabildo (L.A. Times)- 4,250 (10.54%)
• Sara Hernandez (developers/charter schools)- 2,345 (5.81%)
• Arturo Carmona (D)- 2,202 (5.46%)
• Wendy Carillo (D)- 2,186 (5.42%)
• Kenneth Mejia (Green)- 1,962 (4.87%)
• William Morrison (R)- 1,349 (3.35%)
• Yolie Flores (charter schools)- 1,362 (3.38%)
• Alejandra Campoverdi (D)- 999 (2.48%)
• Tracy Van Houten (D)- 1,037 (2.57%)
• Vanessa Aramayo (D)- 840 (2.08%)

A couple of factoids worth noting: Bernie won CA-34. In fact it was the only congressional district in the city that he did win but the 3 candidates desperately fighting to identify themselves as Berniecrats-- Carmona, Carillo and Mejia-- scored a total combined vote of just 14.6%, even less than the big-spending ex-Republican! This can be explained by two factors-- front runner Jimmy Gomez already was known to the voters as a dedicated and successful progressive along Bernie lines and Carmona's campaign went off the rails in the last 4 or 5 days because of sexism charges that took off like wildfire.

Also worth noting that the 2 most-consultant driven campaigns, those of Sara Hernandez and Alejandra Campoverdi, were the two that raised large sums and then squandered virtually all of it on commissionable but utterly ineffective TV ads. Hermandez spent approximately $473,000 on TV (making her consultants a bundle but bringing her barely over 5% of the vote) and Campoverdi spent around $225,000 on pointless TV as well. Contrast that with the winning Gomez campaign which spent virtually all its resources on paid field and GOTV efforts, the effective grassroots campaign technique so hated by the commission-hungry crooks at the DCCC and EMILY's List.

In a heavily Democratic district like CA-34 Gomez will be heavily favored to win the runoff and go to Washington June 6. But, "ex"-Republican Ahn has already demonstrated an ability to raise large sums of money from both Korea and GOP-leaning sources and he has to be watched closely. The last thing anyone wants is a Republican-lite multimillionaire buying a seat for himself in one of the country's bluest and most progressive districts. You can contribute to Gomez's campaign here.

The Conservative L.A. Times Hits The Bullseye With Today's Trump Editorial

L.A. County is not a Republican-free zone, even though areas of L.A. are. Hillary won the county 1,893,770 (71.4%) to just 620,285 (23.4%) for Trump. Steve Knight (CA-25) is the only Republican member of Congress with a substantial piece of L.A. County in his district-- and he's only still in Congress because of massive and repeated DCCC incompetence. Kevin McCarthy (CA-23) and Ed Royce (CA-39) each has a small slice of L.A. in their districts too. But there are congressional districts in L.A. where the Republicans have ceased even running candidates-- CA-29 (Tony Cardenas), CA-32 (Grace Napolitano), CA-34 (Becerra's open seat), CA-37 (Karen Bass), CA-40 (Lucile Roybal-Allard), and CA-44 (Nanette Barragan)-- and in half a dozen L.A. districts Trump took less than 20% of the vote-- less than 10% in Karen Bass' district.

That's the population base the L.A. Times is selling newspapers to. But the L.A. Times is nowhere near as left-leaning as are the people who live in Los Angeles. The paper is published by Tronc (formerly Tribune Publishing of Chicago, a largely conservative outfit with some pretty right-wing papers in its portfolio, including the Chicago Tribune, the Orlando Sentinel and 3 in Orange County). It's neoliberal/neoconservative editorial stance has been hostile to progressive politics since before columnist Bob Scheer was fired over a decade ago. Today, though, the editorial, Our Dishonest President, is the most talked about piece in the paper in years. Their indictment of Trump was meant to be sobering and chilling. For anyone who hasn't followed Trump as closely as we do, it is both. Right from the outset, no words are minced: "It was," they began, "no secret during the campaign that Donald Trump was a narcissist and a demagogue who used fear and dishonesty to appeal to the worst in American voters. The Times called him unprepared and unsuited for the job he was seeking, and said his election would be a 'catastrophe.' Still, nothing prepared us for the magnitude of this train wreck. Like millions of other Americans, we clung to a slim hope that the new president would turn out to be all noise and bluster, or that the people around him in the White House would act as a check on his worst instincts, or that he would be sobered and transformed by the awesome responsibilities of office." As we all know, quite the opposite is how this mess has been playing out.

Instead, seventy-some days in-- and with about 1,400 to go before his term is completed-- it is increasingly clear that those hopes were misplaced.

In a matter of weeks, President Trump has taken dozens of real-life steps that, if they are not reversed, will rip families apart, foul rivers and pollute the air, intensify the calamitous effects of climate change and profoundly weaken the system of American public education for all.

His attempt to de-insure millions of people who had finally received healthcare coverage and, along the way, enact a massive transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich has been put on hold for the moment. But he is proceeding with his efforts to defang the government’s regulatory agencies and bloat the Pentagon’s budget even as he supposedly retreats from the global stage.

These are immensely dangerous developments which threaten to weaken this country’s moral standing in the world, imperil the planet and reverse years of slow but steady gains by marginalized or impoverished Americans. But, chilling as they are, these radically wrongheaded policy choices are not, in fact, the most frightening aspect of the Trump presidency.

What is most worrisome about Trump is Trump himself. He is a man so unpredictable, so reckless, so petulant, so full of blind self-regard, so untethered to reality that it is impossible to know where his presidency will lead or how much damage he will do to our nation. His obsession with his own fame, wealth and success, his determination to vanquish enemies real and imagined, his craving for adulation-- these traits were, of course, at the very heart of his scorched-earth outsider campaign; indeed, some of them helped get him elected. But in a real presidency in which he wields unimaginable power, they are nothing short of disastrous.

Although his policies are, for the most part, variations on classic Republican positions (many of which would have been undertaken by a President Ted Cruz or a President Marco Rubio), they become far more dangerous in the hands of this imprudent and erratic man. Many Republicans, for instance, support tighter border security and a tougher response to illegal immigration, but Trump’s cockamamie border wall, his impracticable campaign promise to deport all 11 million people living in the country illegally and his blithe disregard for the effect of such proposals on the U.S. relationship with Mexico turn a very bad policy into an appalling one.

In the days ahead, The Times editorial board will look more closely at the new president, with a special attention to three troubling traits:

1- Trump’s shocking lack of respect for those fundamental rules and institutions on which our government is based. Since Jan. 20, he has repeatedly disparaged and challenged those entities that have threatened his agenda, stoking public distrust of essential institutions in a way that undermines faith in American democracy. He has questioned the qualifications of judges and the integrity of their decisions, rather than acknowledging that even the president must submit to the rule of law. He has clashed with his own intelligence agencies, demeaned government workers and questioned the credibility of the electoral system and the Federal Reserve. He has lashed out at journalists, declaring them “enemies of the people,” rather than defending the importance of a critical, independent free press. His contempt for the rule of law and the norms of government are palpable.

2- His utter lack of regard for truth. Whether it is the easily disprovable boasts about the size of his inauguration crowd or his unsubstantiated assertion that Barack Obama bugged Trump Tower, the new president regularly muddies the waters of fact and fiction. It’s difficult to know whether he actually can’t distinguish the real from the unreal-- or whether he intentionally conflates the two to befuddle voters, deflect criticism and undermine the very idea of objective truth. Whatever the explanation, he is encouraging Americans to reject facts, to disrespect science, documents, nonpartisanship and the mainstream media-- and instead to simply take positions on the basis of ideology and preconceived notions. This is a recipe for a divided country in which differences grow deeper and rational compromise becomes impossible.

3- His scary willingness to repeat alt-right conspiracy theories, racist memes and crackpot, out-of-the-mainstream ideas. Again, it is not clear whether he believes them or merely uses them. But to cling to disproven “alternative” facts; to retweet racists; to make unverifiable or false statements about rigged elections and fraudulent voters; to buy into discredited conspiracy theories first floated on fringe websites and in supermarket tabloids-- these are all of a piece with the Barack Obama birther claptrap that Trump was peddling years ago and which brought him to political prominence. It is deeply alarming that a president would lend the credibility of his office to ideas that have been rightly rejected by politicians from both major political parties.

Where will this end? Will Trump moderate his crazier campaign positions as time passes? Or will he provoke confrontation with Iran, North Korea or China, or disobey a judge’s order or order a soldier to violate the Constitution? Or, alternately, will the system itself-- the Constitution, the courts, the permanent bureaucracy, the Congress, the Democrats, the marchers in the streets-- protect us from him as he alienates more and more allies at home and abroad, steps on his own message and creates chaos at the expense of his ability to accomplish his goals? Already, Trump’s job approval rating has been hovering in the mid-30s, according to Gallup, a shockingly low level of support for a new president. And that was before his former national security advisor, Michael Flynn, offered to cooperate last week with congressional investigators looking into the connection between the Russian government and the Trump campaign.

On Inauguration Day, we wrote on this page that it was not yet time to declare a state of “wholesale panic” or to call for blanket “non-cooperation” with the Trump administration. Despite plenty of dispiriting signals, that is still our view. The role of the rational opposition is to stand up for the rule of law, the electoral process, the peaceful transfer of power and the role of institutions; we should not underestimate the resiliency of a system in which laws are greater than individuals and voters are as powerful as presidents. This nation survived Andrew Jackson and Richard Nixon. It survived slavery. It survived devastating wars. Most likely, it will survive again.

But if it is to do so, those who oppose the new president’s reckless and heartless agenda must make their voices heard. Protesters must raise their banners. Voters must turn out for elections. Members of Congress-- including and especially Republicans-- must find the political courage to stand up to Trump. Courts must safeguard the Constitution. State legislators must pass laws to protect their citizens and their policies from federal meddling. All of us who are in the business of holding leaders accountable must redouble our efforts to defend the truth from his cynical assaults.

The United States is not a perfect country, and it has a great distance to go before it fully achieves its goals of liberty and equality. But preserving what works and defending the rules and values on which democracy depends are a shared responsibility. Everybody has a role to play in this drama.

This is the first in a series.

The page included a blown up pull-out quote-- "Those who oppose the new president’s reckless and heartless agenda must make their voices heard"-- which is a powerful endorsement of the voices of principled resistance inside Congress, resistance an L.A. area congressman, Ted Lieu, has been in the forefront of. It is a resistance Ted has asked voters in CA-34, who will go to the polls Tuesday, to help him with by sending Jimmy Gomez to Congress. "During these extraordinarily dangerous times," he told voters in Highland Park, Boyle Heights, Chinatown, Eagle Rock, El Sereno, Downtown and Koreatown, we need fighters like Jimmy Gomez in Congress. I served with Jimmy in the California Legislature and I know he will always and relentlessly fight for progressive values. More importantly, I need Jimmy with me as soon as possible so that we can keep punching back against the failing Donald Trump." True to form, the L.A. Times endorsed some also-ran who's unlikely to appeal to even 5% of the voters Tuesday. But CA-34 voters looking for more smart, principled and unflinching resistance to Trumpism would do well to listen to what Ted Lieu asked them to do and vote for Gomez. The thermometer on the right, by the way, isn't for contributions to Gomez-- you can do that here if you want to; there will be a runoff in June-- but for Ted Lieu and the other loudest, strongest and most strategic voices of congressional resistance. We have to support them as part of our own resistance to tyranny and kakistocracy.

One more thing about CA-34. Los Angeles was Clinton country in the general, obviously, but, less obviously, it was in the primary as well. Los Angeles County voted for Hillary over Bernie 590,502 (57.0%) to 434,656 (42.0%). She swept every congressional district in the county except one-- the fightin' 34th. That's right, my friends, Bernie took that district in the primary... all the more reason the voters there should elect the most Bernie-like of all the candidates running for Congress there in 2 days: Jimmy Gomez, the only candidate with a record of accomplishment very much like Bernie's. (Polls show that the second place is held by Robert Lee Ahn, a big-spending, very conservative and very wealthy Republican who recently switched to the Democratic Party and whose only appeal is based on ethnic solidarity.)

Trump's In A Deep Hole-- But Can The Democrats Capitalize On The Opportunity?

The battle to take back America starts now-- in L.A. and Georgia-- Ossoff and Gomez

In a Washingtron Post OpEd yesterday, Michael Gershon wrote "This is a pretty bad combination: empty, easily distracted, vindictive, shallow, impatient, incompetent and morally small. This is not the profile of a governing party…It is now dawning on Republicans what they have done to themselves. They thought they could somehow get away with Trump. That he could be contained. That the adults could provide guidance. That the economy might come to the rescue. That the damage could be limited... Instead, they are seeing a downward spiral of incompetence and public contempt-- a collapse that is yet to reach a floor. A presidency is failing. A party unable to govern is becoming unfit to govern. And what, in the short term, can be done about it? Nothing. Nothing at all."

Ted Lieu begs to differ. There will be multiple opportunities to slow Trump down and derail his toxic agenda before 2020. The obvious place is the 2018 congressional midterms. But, the first of the congressional special elections is this Tuesday-- right here in L.A. Ted Lieu has become a national household name because of his fierce, unrelenting and sometimes entertaining resistance to Trump and Trumpism. Last month Ted, who repesents CA-33, had a message about the special election in CA-34: "During these extraordinarily dangerous times, we need fighters like Jimmy Gomez in Congress. I served with Jimmy in the California Legislature and I know he will always and relentlessly fight for progressive values. More importantly, I need Jimmy with me as soon as possible so that we can keep punching back against the failing Donald Trump.". And exactly 2 weeks after that: GA-06, where it looks possible for Democrat Jon Ossoff to win a suburban Georgia district that the DCCC had never previously even dreamed about contesting. (Blue America has endorsed both Gomez and Ossoff and you can contribute directly to their campaigns here. Both are expected to go to June run-offs.)

As Dan Walters noted in the Sacramento Bee this week, "a blue state backlash against President Donald Trump’s so-far-erratic performance and a Republican-controlled Congress, keyed to hot-button issues such as immigration and health care, will shrink the California GOP’s already thin congressional ranks-- just 14 of 53 seats. Ted Lieu was elected by the congressmembers from California, Washington, Oregon, Nevada and Hawaii to serve as the very first West Coast regional vice-chairman of the DCCC. You can expect a more long range and strategic approach, the end of DCCC antipathy towards progressives and-- among other developments like this: the first DCCC-backed challenge ever to Devin Nunes.

SHOCKER: Early voting so far in R+14 GA-06

There are 24 candidates running in Tuesday's CA-34 primary so it's virtually impossible for overwhelming frontrunner Jimmy Gomez to win outright, even if no other candidates manage to get much beyond single digit support. But in GA-06, Ossoff thinks he could take the 50% +1 vote that he needs to avoid a June runoff. "The campaign’s goal is not to get into a runoff, though we’ll be ready to fight a runoff if necessary. The campaign’s goal is to win this election outright on April 18." Early voting indicates he may be right. Only 31% of early voters participated in the last GOP primary. 55%, though, voted in the last Democratic primary. What that means is that, so far, at least, Republicans are expressing their desire to see Trumpism stopped by staying away from the election. Not as good as a vote for Ossoff-- but it will accomplish the same thing.

And right as the GOP is meting down-- or, as Sahil Kapur put it for Businessweek yesterday: total control is crippling the GOP-- the anti-government/non-governing party shouldn't be in government.

Ryan has an almost impossible job of uniting the party. The forces that stymied Boehner remain in place. “This isn’t a matter of Ryan not being capable...This is a matter of arithmetic.”
 Ryan’s push to pass a tax-reform bill won’t be any easier. The Freedom Caucus is already angling against a key component: revenue neutrality, where any tax cut is offset by equal revenue increases. Without offsets for tax cuts, an overhaul can’t be permanent without Senate Democratic support; it’ll have to be limited to 10 years. The main offset Ryan has proposed, a border adjustment provision to raise taxes for net importers and cut them for exporters, has divided the Right.

While Ryan can afford to lose some 20 Republicans in the House and still pass bills without Democratic support, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has 52 GOP votes, and most bills require 60 votes. Funding bills and debt limit increases, both of which require 60, are likely to get caught in the crossfire.

With the government set to run out of funding on April 28, conservatives in the House, spoiling for a win, want to use both issues to push for steep cuts to programs for the middle class and poor, which won’t sit well with the Tuesday Group. The Freedom Caucus also wants to defund Planned Parenthood, which Democrats won’t support.

Altogether, it’s enough to make Republicans wonder if they’re even capable of governing anymore. Hoagland, the former GOP aide, sees only one way out for Ryan: work with Democrats. “It may be difficult for the speaker,” he says, “but it also is the way legislation used to be done around here.”

This week Ryan, a spoiled, childish ideologue, actually chastised Trump for saying he could envision working in a bipartisan way on health care-- with Democrats for the good of the American people. Ryan wasn't having any of it! As for the Senate, 2018 is one steep hill to climb for Team Blue-- and the key is holding the red state Democrats and adding two swingy states-- Nevada and Arizona-- and one really daunting task: taking out plutocrat-backed Ted Cruz. The job got a smidge easier Friday when popular El Paso Congressman Beto O'Rourke jumped into the race. Here-- at the ActBlue U.S. Senate thermometer on the right-- is where you can contribute directly to Beto without the money going through Schumer's and the DSCC's sticky fingers. Imagine replacing Ted Cruz with Beto O'Rourke. In fact, do more than imagine it! (I think you'll like the other names on the page as well.)

Was Tom Cotton Right? Will Trumpcare Kill GOP Chances To Hold The House In 2018?

Republicans have been reciting their talking points like little automatons all week-- Obamacare is collapsing, premiums going up, deductibles, a third of the counties... etc. Few people people have been taken in other than those already brainwashed by Hate Talk Radio and Fox. Yesterday, though, Secretary of Health Tom Price took the campaign of lies a step further. He was on Meet the Press. He looked right into the camera and lied his ass off: "I firmly believe that nobody will be worse off financially in the process that we're going through. They'll have choices that they can select the kind of coverage that they want for themselves and for their family, not the government forces them to buy." What a load of bullshit from a real hustler!

Price's and Ryan's arguments were shattered yesterday in a powerful piece of reporting in the Washington Post by Jessica Contrera that goes beyond asserting that people will be hurt by Trumpcare and shows that the very people who will be most hurt are the desperate and deceived masses who voted for Trump and the Republicans in the first place. She focuses on ex-coal miners, the ones who believed Trump when he said he would bring back their jobs and protect Medicaid. All the biggest coal producing counties in America-- in Wyoming, West Virginia, Kentucky and Pennsylvania-- voted overwhelmingly for Trump. These are the 7 biggest coal mining counties and how they voted in November:

• Campbell County, WY- 88% Trump, 7% Clinton
• Marshall County, WV- 73% Trump, 22% Clinton
• Boone County, WV- 75% Trump, 21% Clinton
• Logan County, WV- 80% Trump, 17% Clinton
• Pike County, KY- 80% Trump, 17% Clinton
• Harlan County, KY- 85% Trump, 13% Clinton
• Perry County, KY- Trump 77%, Clinton 20%

She writes about a 54 year old West Virginia man in Northfork in McDowell County, the county with the shortest life expectancy in the nation, and the county Bernie and Chris Hayes are broadcasting from this evening. McDowell went for Trump 75.8% to 20.5%. It also has America's mostly deadly opioid problem-- with the most deaths from overdose-- of any county in the country. Like so many in this corner of Appalachia, Clyde, she wrote, "used to have a highly paid job at a coal mine. Company insurance covered all of his medical needs. Then he lost the job and ended up here, holding a cane and suffering not only from heartburn but diabetes, arthritis, diverticulitis, high blood pressure and high cholesterol."

Because of the ACA, Clyde’s visit is covered by Medicaid. Before the law, most West Virginians without children or disabilities could not qualify for Medicaid, no matter how poor they were. The ACA-- better known here as Obamacare-- expanded the program to cover more people, such as Clyde, who can depend on Keisha to fix his heartburn without having to worry about the cost.

As for the other problems in his life, he has put his hopes in Trump, who came to West Virginia saying he would bring back coal and put miners back to work. When Trump mentioned repealing Obamacare, Clyde wasn’t sure what that might mean for his Medicaid. But if he had a job that provided health insurance, he reasoned, he wouldn’t need Medicaid anyway, so he voted for Trump, along with 74 percent of McDowell County.

Tug River Health Association treats about 8,700 patients, resulting in some 20,000 visits a year to its five clinics. In 2016, 12,284 of those visits were from patients on Medicaid, up from 5,674 in 2013, before the ACA took effect here. Without the ACA, many of those patients wouldn’t be able to afford care. Will they soon lose their coverage? Will they stop coming to the clinic? Lately, Tug River’s chief executive has been telling his staff, “The key word going forward is uncertainty.”

...In other parts of the country, the primary impact of the ACA has been requiring people to have private health insurance, but in poor and sick communities like McDowell County, the law’s dominant effect has been the Medicaid expansion, which has given more people access to the kind of health care that wasn’t widely available or affordable to them before. With an insurance card in her pocket, the patient at Tammy’s window can venture into the realms of medical care that are typically out of reach to those without one: blood work, immunizations, specialized doctors, surgery, physical therapy.

If she needs mental health counseling, the clinic no longer sends her to the next county over; last July, Tug River was able to hire a psychologist, who is now treating 180 people, many of whom are trying to overcome opioid addictions.

If she needs medication, the nurses won’t go digging in a closet of samples left by drug reps as they used to do for the uninsured. The medication will come from a pharmacy and cost no more than a few dollars.

...[T]here is another version of uncertainty in the clinic, this time a patient’s. If she signs up for Medicaid, which covers low-income, pregnant women, she’ll be covered through her pregnancy. But after that? Her access to insurance will depend on what happens over the next months in Washington, where so many plans for the ACA’s replacement are floating around. One, just unveiled in the House, would roll back the Medicaid expansion slowly, meaning Amanda could keep her public insurance after the baby is born. In a few years, however, someone like her might not be able to do the same, and instead might receive tax credits to help offset the cost of private insurance.

But that’s just one plan. There have been plans based on “block grants” and plans based on “per-capita caps.” Some plans give people tax credits based on their income. Some base the tax credits on their age; some on where a person lives. There’s the plan once proposed by Trump’s secretary of health and human services, which would get rid of the Medicaid expansion entirely. There’s the plan Vice President Pence implemented when he was governor of Indiana, which penalizes anyone who doesn’t pay for Medicaid coverage, even if all they can afford is a dollar a month. There’s even a plan that proposes keeping the Medicaid expansion just as it is.

The Democrats, of course, are already hoping to use health care insecurity as a cudgel to beat the Republicans over the head with in 2018. There isn't a candidate I speak to who doesn't bring up Ryan's Trumpcare bill when telling me how he or she plans to beat a Republican incumbent in 2018. In fact, NRSC staffers are whispering privately that their best shots to beat Democratic senators is with anyone but a House member who winds up voting for Trumpcare!

California's most progressive state legislator, Assemblyman Jimmy Gomez isn't running against a Republican, but in a special election for an open seat in Los Angeles. There are 23 candidates and not only is he way ahead, polling shows him with close to 40% with his nearest competitor, the closest thing this part of L.A. has to a Republican (developer and charter school-financed Sara Hernandez), polling around 6%, close to the margin of error, despite a barrage of expensive misleading and non-stop TV ads paid for by the right-wing special interests that support her. Jimmy appears to be ignoring her and focusing on what he plans to do in Congress. Nearly the entire congressional delegation has endorsed him, including outgoing Rep Xavier Becerra and district neighbors Judy Chu, Grace Napolitano and Ted Lieu. He's not pulling any punches; look at this tweet from yesterday:

Maybe that had something to do with the enthusiastic endorsement from Ted Lieu: "During these extraordinarily dangerous times, we need fighters like Jimmy Gomez in Congress. I served with Jimmy in the California Legislature and I know he will always and relentlessly fight for progressive values. More importantly, I need Jimmy with me as soon as possible so that we can keep punching back against the failing Donald Trump."

Yesterday Tom Cotton (R-AR) went on Meet the Press and warned House Republicans that if they vote for Trumpcare they're jeopardizing their reelection chances. "Do not walk the plank and vote for a bill that cannot pass the Senate and then have to face the consequences of that vote," he said. "I'm afraid that if they vote for this bill, they're going to put the House majority at risk next year." Cotton isn't right about much, but he's right about that. Right after Meet the Press I spoke with 3 Blue America candidates already taking it to GOP incumbents for the 2018 cycle-- Tom Guild, who's opposing Steve Russell in Oklahoma, Geoff Petzel, who's running for the seat Peter Roskam holds in Chicagoland and Tom Wakely, eager to finish the job of ending Lamar Smith's political career in the Austin/San Antonio area.

Tom Guild wanted to hear Steve Russell's excuses for backing TrumpCare so he went to his town hall. "Access to affordable health care," he told us, "is a prerequisite for reclaiming the American Dream that some Americans no longer feel is within their reach. Instead of helping Oklahomans and Americans gain health care coverage, my Republican Tea Party Opponent, incumbent Rep. Steve Russell, wants to take it away. I attended a recent town hall in Shawnee, which is a fairly conservative part of the fifth congressional district. Russell was asked about Medicare and was clearly confused as he talked about TrumpCare instead. The audience was calling out “answer the question” but to no avail. He then was questioned by a man whose daughter has autism and his wife was diagnosed with breast cancer. He said that before the Affordable Care Act, he was unable to cover either one of them because of their pre-existing conditions. Under the ACA, the man offered that he now has coverage for both at an affordable cost. He asked Russell what he would do to ensure that he could continue to cover both of them. Russell waxed eloquently about the health savings accounts that would be available under the proposed TrumpCare winding its way through Congress. The man said he spent every dime he had to survive and was unlikely a good candidate for a HSA. He also said the ACA made it illegal to put a lifetime cap on coverage under a health insurance plan, and that without that provision, he would have already busted through a million dollar cap. Russell indicated that he favors lifetime caps on health insurance coverage. Russell then again went back to his talking points and talked about the marvelous health saving accounts that would be available under the new Republican health care plan. People then asked Russell about his own health care coverage. People offered help from the audience that taxpayers pay for his health care coverage. He said taxpayers didn’t pay for his coverage, because he was covered by Tricare. People loudly offered that Tricare was funded by taxpayers, too, and counseled Russell that he was covered by government run socialized medicine. Russell got defensive and talked about his heroic military service for the third time at the town hall and went on to not answering the next question asked. Russell doesn’t get it that as many as 15 million Americans will lose their current health care coverage under TrumpCare. Russell was offering up dog food, but the audience was refusing to eat the food. He was clearly in over his head, and discombobulated and confused that his act wasn’t well received by an audience that ordinarily would have been eating out of his hand. Russell is clearly a threat to your health."

So is Peter Roskam. Geoff Petzel is running against the knee-jerk conservative incumbent in the suburbs west of Chicago. Geoff told us that "Roskam and other radical Republicans who vote for the Trumpcare proposal are at risk of losing their seats. Every day I have voters telling me how important the ACA is to their families-- these are not just Democrats-- Republican voters are telling me they also want to save the Affordable Care Act. In the IL-06 District, the ACA has decreased the number of uninsured patients by 31%. As one of those people now insured because of the ACA I know how personal and emotional this issue is for people. I am confident that any Republican who votes to take away our health insurance, will effectively be voting to give up their seat in Congress in 2018."

Tom Wakely has a completely different approach to health care from the one being advanced by Paul Ryan, Lamar Smith and the Republican Party. It's the classic progressive/populist approach, which excited Bernie supporters and Trump supporters alike, although which Trump supporters must now feel a little let down over as Trump has morphed into Paul Ryan. "One of the major complaints I hear about my Congressman Lamar Smith," he told us, "is that he is out of touch with his constituents and nothing could be closer to the truth than his support of the Republican plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. It does not seem to bother Smith that if the Republicans succeed in their efforts over 30,000 people in his district will be stripped of their health insurance. That is unacceptable to me. I believe what is needed  at this time is a public option, i.e a government-run health insurance agency which would compete with private health insurance companies for your business and a Kaiser Foundation poll taking just before last years presidential election shows that a majority of Americans support the public option. However, I see the public option only playing an interim role, a step in the right direction so to speak. What I believe we really need in this country is a single-payer national health insurance program otherwise known as 'Medicare for all.' Oh, I know that Smith and the Republicans as well as a few Democrats would scream and yell about 'socialized medicine' but we already have socialized medicine in this country serving over 17% of our population. Those two programs are the VA Health Care System and Medicare. If these two programs are good enough for our veterans and our senior citizens, it should be good enough for the rest of the country."

The Blue America thermometer above leads to a contribution page for the campaigns of Tom Wakely, Geoff Petzel, Tom Guild, Jimmy Gomez and our other congressional challengers forcefully speaking out about Ryan's Trumpcare proposal. Please consider helping them get their messages out in any way you can.

Bernie Never Wanted A Cult Of Personality

It's easy to look at Republicans, especially Trumpists, and their information sources-- Fox, Hate Talk Radio, Breitbart...-- and dismiss them as ignorant morons incapable of abstract thought. Remember, abstract thought doesn't come easy to folks with IQs of less than 100-- and half the population, by definition, has 2-digit IQs. If you want to be honest, though, not everyone lacing the ability for critical thinking is a Trumpist... or even a Republicans. There are probably as many moron Democrats-- or almost as many-- as there are moron Republicans. A cult of personality is much easier than understanding complex and nuanced issues-- whether for Trump fans or, alas, Bernie fans. The difference, though, is that Trump encourages it every day and in every way. Bernie doesn't.

I don't know what percentage of Democratic politicians sided with Hillary over Bernie during the 2016 cycle. But let me guess: 85%. Just a guess. It could have been 90%. But let's look at it from a different perspective. Ask yourself how many Democratic politicians preferred Bernie's agenda and positions to Hillary's. That's where we see a more even split between the progressives-- the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party-- and the corrupt careerists of the establishment along with the Blue Dogs and New Dems-- the Republican wing of the Democratic Party, the Clinton wing. Now we're talking about a more even split-- 50/50? 60/40?

As you probably know, I dedicate a few hours a day talking with Democratic candidates and perspective candidates. Virtually all of them bring up Bernie's issues. Virtually none of them bring up Hillary's agenda. NONE.

Ted Lieu has probably been the most effective and galvanizing voice in Congress resisting Trump. He was just elected-- not selected-- regional vice chairman of the DCCC for the West Coast. Yesterday afternoon he told us why he's backing Jimmy Gomez for the CA-34 congressional primary. It makes a lot more sense than talking about who supported who in last year's primary election. "During these extraordinarily dangerous times, we need fighters like Jimmy Gomez in Congress. I served with Jimmy in the California Legislature and I know he will always and relentlessly fight for progressive values. More importantly, I need Jimmy with me as soon as possible so that we can keep punching back against the failing Donald Trump."

Bernie was the founder of the Congressional Progressive Caucus-- and it's first chairman. Last year his first endorsements came from the current co-chairs, Raul Grijalva and Keith Ellison. The only other members who endorsed him were Alan Grayson (FL) and Peter Welch (VT). Since then, Berniecrats Pramila Jayapal (WA) and Ro Khanna (CA) have been elected to Congress ands have joined the caucus. Most of the other caucus members were Hillary backers, although a few, super-progressives, like Barbara Lee and Mark Pocan, stayed neutral and expressed equal admiration for both candidates. Today, the two freshmen with 100% Progressive Punch crucial vote scores are Pramila Jayapal, the Seattle Berniecrat, and Ruben Kihuen, a strong Clinton backer from the Las Vegas area. On policy, though, both are identical in their advocacy of what amounts to the Bernie agenda.

Conservative Democrats Tulsi Gabbard (HI) and Collin Peterson (MN) both endorsed Bernie during the primary, Gabbard in a very big way. Gabbard's Progressive Punch crucial vote score is a dismal 73.90, an "F" in one of the bluest districts in America. Perhaps it helps her get more bookings on Fox and helps enhance her friendship with Bannon, Adelson and the throngs of Islamaphobes and homophobes who recognize her as a kindred soul. Peterson, who hasn't been embraced by most Bernie supporters is even worse than Gabbard. His Progressive Punch crucial vote score for the current session is ZERO and for his whole career 39.75. Don't ask me what makes him a Democrat, but he virtually votes opposite of Bernie on every single important issue to come before Congress. So far this year there are 11 Republicans whose voting records are more supportive of Bernie's positions than Peterson is.

Nice of him to endorse Bernie for the Democratic nomination though. His western Minnesota district voted 61.6% to 38.4% for Bernie and against Hillary in the caucuses last year. Gabbard's district (basically all of Hawaii outside Honolulu) was even stronger for Bernie-- 69.8% to 30.0%. Just sayin'.

So what do you want-- a party that pledges fealty to a personality or a party that pledges fealty to a progressive agenda? Many Democrats who backed Hillary are good solid, sincere progressives who made a bad mistake for whatever reason. And there were many reasons-- from personal relationships to fear of the Clinton Machine to wanting to be with a winner. Terrible but across the country I'm seeing Bernie fans getting behind next-to-worthless candidates who, on some level, backed Bernie over Hillary but have, literally, nothing else to recommend them.

One of the worst examples from last year was contemptible corporate whore Shawn O'Connor in New Hampshire's first congressional district. One day O'Connor was campaigning on "compromising" with the Republicans by cutting Medicare and Social Security and, finally realizing that's a bad message for a Democratic primary, he endorsed Bernie and went around the state with him-- a Bernie low-point in my eyes. (No one's perfect.) Polling showed the million dollar self-funding Wall Street creep O'Connor losing the primary. Furious, he decide dot try to beat progressive Democrat Carol Shea-Porter (a Clinton backer with a solid progressive record) by running as an Independent and throwing the November election to Tea Party incumbent Frank Guinta.

He nearly succeeded. A worthless pile of garbage, O'Connor managed to grab 34,612 votes (9.4%)-- many of them from deluded Bernie fans-- giving Shea-Porter an uncomfortably close call in a district that went for Trump. Shea-Porter won 161,828 votes (44.2%) while Guinta took 157,011 votes (42.9%). Trump won NH-01 48.2% to 46.6%. It was a miracle Shea-Porter won.

When I interview candidates for Congress I ask them where they stood on the Bernie-Hillary primary. But the answer isn't determinative. If they were for Bernie, that starts out as a plus but it's not nearly as important as where the candidate stands on Bernie's issues, how they look on the courageousness scale and what kind of experience they've had. Example: Brianna Wu, one of the women targeted by Milo and the other Gamergate thugs, was an outspoken Hillary supporter. Today she's running for Congress against right-wing Democrat Stephen Lynch. In her official announcement of candidacy, she writes that "the contentious primary between Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton revealed a deep divide that must be reconciled. There is a disconnect between those marginalized and our party leaders who vote too often as moderate Republicans. I personally supported Hillary Clinton in the primary, but today I see the vision of Bernie Sanders for America is one we must bring to pass. I believe today’s Democratic party is ill-equipped to fight the Trump administration’s assault on women, on people of color, on the poor, and on the LGBT community. We do have true progressives, but too often they don’t have the support of the party establishment." Her district is entirely within Suffolk County where primary votes pretty overwhelmingly went for Hillary over Bernie-- 78,083 (57.1%) to 57,872 (41.8%). Wu's statement about Bernie vision for America is similar to candidates I'm hearing from everywhere. Bernie fans would be making a big mistake to write them off as unworthy of support because it took them too long to understand why Bernie would have been a far better candidate than Clinton.

On an average tweet I post, I get around 7-800 impressions. There's a reason why these two from Saturday after the DNC election were so much more.

Sunday afternoon, Keith Ellison reached out to his supporters-- like myself-- with this message of unity in the face of Trumpism:

The Democratic Party finally has a leader-- a leader who has demonstrated time and again that he has what it takes to fight for all Americans. That leader is my good friend, Tom Perez.

I’m immensely proud of everything that our campaign accomplished, of how hard my staff, volunteers, and delegates fought. And now, I ask all those who love our country and believed in our vision to support Tom.

With Trump in the White House, at stake is the very essence of our democracy, and I want us to be able to look back at this moment and tell ourselves that we did the right thing and helped Tom succeed.

We must be united-- because we live in times when the judiciary is under attack, when the press is under attack, and hate groups are desecrating Jewish cemeteries and defacing mosques. Two Indian men were even shot down for looking ‘foreign’ in the eyes of the terrorist who shot them.

I look forward to returning to Congress and continuing to represent the 5th Congressional district of Minnesota. And I look forward to helping the Democratic Party in any way that I can. I urge all to do the same. Working people across this country are depending on us.