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The Wuhan Woo Woo

Ever since the pandemic began - indeed, even before it began - the question of how we got here, how the virus got here, has been mostly a tantalizing puzzle. Unfortunately, it's also been the minor question on which to hang yet another broad, crazy, and mostly right wing conspiracy. (PS, one fun followup: check out the myth of Tantalus).

The unfolding of the "how did this virus get started in China" story - a fairly simple explanation clouded with pseudoscience, speculation and poor reporting of all sorts - is yet another example of both the general failure to rein in conspiracies hurts our discourse... but also the failure of folks who could stop these things early often miss the signs of conspiracy dead ahead.

Lurking within the story is also some more specialized failings in medical science - a tale in which virologists turn out to be good at identifying virus strains, but it's epidemiologists who figure out how viruses get transmitted. And therein lies the tale of how Wuhan went from merely an early locus point to a tale of magical WooWoo.

Much of the confusion centers on  what is, most likely, merely geographic serendipity: Wuhan, in addition to being the first major city to fall to the pandemic, happens to be the major regional center where China developed its central laboratory for studying viruses. That fact, which was noted as the pandemic started to spread, has become the focal point for a wild tale about the possibility of a lab created "super virus" spread either accidentally or deliberately by Chinese officials. If that sounds vaguely like the plot of a Hollywood thriller... that's because, basically, it is (thank you Michael Crichton).

The specifics of the conspiracy theory, as they do, has morphed and shifted, usually as scientists and others have pointed out all the evidence that widely debunks it - there is, for instance, the common sense point that the Chinese government seemed awfully cavalier or ill prepared for a massive virus they, theoretically, launched on their own people. And they seemed awfully determined, for weeks, to hide the enormity, severity, and highly contagious concerns about said virus well after it would have been simply prudent to take far more consequential steps to stop or slow its spread.

Then there's the fact that almost every expert in virology says a) the genetics of the virus suggest two strains, both of which appear to have existed before and well away from Wuhan at the earliest known moments of the outbreak.  There's the fact that a virology lab has careful scientific controls to prevent outbreaks, all of which the Wuhan scientists appear to have followed. Then there's the fact that no one can exactly pinpoint the exact strains in the Wuhan lab, even among the scientists who, yes, were ill, in Wuhan, during the early days of the pandemic there.

Then there's the fact that, while the virus strains are known and linked to bat viruses, the exact leap from bat to humans is unclear. This is where epidemiology takes over and points out that the virus most likely jumped from bat to human in rural areas, possibly local markets, where food is scarce and bat consumption is both possible and unsafe. It's also suggested that all of this may have happened, first, in Yunnan province, which is not near Wuhan. 

Given all that, the conspiracy has now morphed to... "well, say the lab got a sample and it accidentally infected some rando scientist and then got into the hospital..." interesting, but doesn't track with timing, dates, or the rna of the virus... or, more pointedly, any of the story of China's initial spread.

Still, the conspiracy soldiers on. Articles about the Wuhan Lab started early last year, and have reappeared, with mindless frequency, somewhere between 5 weeks and 2 months apart. Each article leads to another round of tweets, theories and eventual debunking... and then the next one appears and the cycle restarts. Last April, Tom Cotton used elements of the story to vaguely assert that there was something murky, possibly deliberate about China's role in spreading the virus... only to back off and claim "I never said that" when called on it. Trump, of course, asserted the claim repeatedly. The "Wuhan Lab story" is a staple of right wing news at this point, now a cudgel used to suggest that "people were silenced" for even trying to make the claim, and insisting that "it's reasonable to raise a theory." This, too, misses the point of theories: there are lots of theories. Most of them are wrong. Raising them doesn't prove that they have value; nor that they are true.

Or, just consider Megan McArdle, the absolute paragon of contrarians: despite acknowledging, repeatedly, that the vast consensus of scientific assessment is a zoonotic transmission, McArdle asserts that it "hurts science" not to spend endless amounts of time hearing out any and every loony alternative "until we know for sure". What we know is that virologists have identified a virus. And epidemiologists have identified a likely route of transmission of that virus. It's true that, in terms of exact date and time and location, there's still plenty to figure out. It may not surprise you to know that it also took years to nail down the probable causes and routes of transmission of many viruses, including HIV and Ebola. We also spent far too long batting back idiotic rumors and theories about those as well. And why? Not because science fails us, but because we, in fact, refuse to believe science, never mind understand that what "conclusive" means to scientists, and what it is for journalists is actually not that same thing. Which is to say, long before we have conclusive scientific evidence, we can actually say that we know some things.

There will, no doubt, be more Wuhan WooWoo to come - the right has folded this nonsense into its overarching argument about being talked down to by the Intellectual Elite, and that conspiracy will be trotted out, surely, anytime someone yet again mutters darkly that no one really knows if it came from a lab in Wuhan, or a wet market. What's ridiculous in all of this is that we do know, we have known for some time, and while science cannot state the thing with the kind of certainty some people require, batting down this nonsense is nowhere near as hard as some continually rehash it to be. What's exasperating, to me, is that this an easy, just takes a few minutes to debunk, piece of nonsense. And yet, here it is, spinning out of control. And that, even I have to admit, is why Trump and the Big Lie is far more terrifying than it ever ought to be: if we can't nail the easy ones... how will we ever stop the monsters that really have taken on a life of their own?

Coming Home

About six months ago, I made a strange, and wondrous, and scary decision to do the thing I'd always wanted to do: work from home, focus on writing, and see how that works out.

Obviously, it wasn't an entirely voluntary decision - in the sense that, it's not a decision that would have made nearly as much sense had we not been in the middle of absolute crazy time. 

It's weird, living through a pandemic. It's remarkable, to me, how clarifying the past year has been: how quickly it separated the things that are absolutely necessary (say, to stay alive) from the less than essential (going to the movies, for instance). In almost an instant, everything I'd based my decision making on - is that fun? do I want things? - was replaced with "what will keep my mother from catching a deadly infection." Ordering groceries to be delivered. Going to deserted parks. Life became, in so many ways, so much simpler.

Even when I went back to work (after a 3 month leave, essentially, to make sure mom was as safe as possible), I found trying to resume old routines was impossible without applying my newfound clarity. And, within months, that same newfound clarity was finding myself asking "what work really is most important and ultimately, most satisfying?" 

And so, I came back to what I've always wanted to do most - be here, and write.

I haven't done much. if any, specific pandemic posting; it's not what I think of as "my blog." Plus, I'm not sure it's exactly fascinating - we've all been at home, more or less. It's not easy. But somehow... we carry on.

But what was really interesting to me, what has been interesting in a voyage of discovery that, to my surprise has been generally positive, is discovering life at home. This life is not what I expected or planned. And it has been eye opening. 

For years, I threw myself into work. I went in early, stayed late, worked hard, Laundry, cleaning... home tasks came a distant second. My day off was "catch up on projects." I would tell myself that, one day, I would tackle some bigger plans, really "get organized." Somehow, the time for that was never quite there.

When I got home this past November, and began tackling those very projects... I quickly realized that I had been kidding myself. For years. These were not small projects. Getting my room together, organizing clothes, really making my desk a proper writing pace, starting to do research.... this was a lot of work. It was the work I'd put off to do... other work. And, as it turned out, tackling these 'minor home projects" was also valuable. And satisfying, And required attention and care.

This past Christmas was the first in years where we had a reasonable time to prepare. It was relaxed and festive and I didn't feel, for once, as it was rushed or ended too soon. I discovered the time to invest in making great coffee every morning, making that healthy fruit smoothie I was starting to like having around, to show up for volunteer activities I'd been missing. And, working on the book project that fueled this switch, I'm discovering that writing and editing is really work I love and love to pursue. 

It's easy in this pandemic to focus on the privations, the limitations, the struggles... the losses and the distance. I'm not made for that - life is too full of possibilities and hope and the chance to grow. There has got to be some good to find in all of this. Or we will just have to make it.

And this isn't to dismiss the work I used to do. I ran into a young woman at my old store the other night. She had started a month before I left, it was her first job, and her second day it rained badly and she got soaked walking to work. She was in tears, felt defeated and wanted to quit. I sat her down, talked to her, and eventually told her to go home and I would cover her day out. Now, happily, she's working there full time, and she knows that my assistance is what kept her there and she thanked me.  I miss the opportunity to be a part of that.

Growing up, I read Erma Bombeck a lot; her essays on life, suburban living and homemaker based feminism was humorous and inspiring; I recommend her highly. And, just like some man, I find myself writing about discovering laundry and cooking as if it was some sort of mystical land, and of course, it's not. But I will credit the pandemic with the opportunity to step back, reassess life as I've known it, and discover things I never quite knew. Coming home, being home... it does feel right, and okay. There will be time to figure out what life looks like after a pandemic, when we get there. And I know it's not possible for everyone... but we have been given, by fate and by disease, a real chance to reassess what life in America looks like. At the very least, we ought to explore what that might look like.

Recounting, Every Single Minute

And while the pessimist in me agrees that there's a lot of bad outcomes possible... let's just take a minute and contemplate just how remarkably stupid and incoherent the Maricopa Recount actually is, and how bad it is actually going.

For months, Arizona Republicans insisted that there were so many errors and frauds in the counting of Maricopa County - which took longer than just about everyone to certify its votes, but where Joe Biden pulled ahead several days and thousands of votes sooner than expected - that there should be a recount. So Maricopa County recounted them... and got the same result. Then they audited the count... and got the same result.

Still unsatisfied, Arizona Republicans used a hugely doubtful approach of having the state Senate subpoena all of Maricopa County's ballots, records, and equipment to... well, it's still kind of unclear what all they think they're going to do, but a recount is definitely part of it.

Lots of people are making fun of the name of "Cyber Ninjas" the company hired to do the recount process; but I think the real joke is underappreciated: there's nothing to suggest that a small cybersecurity operation ever understood, had the expertise, or the organizational skill to pull off a recount of one of the five largest counties in the country. And so far, that's the joke that making this recount into a punchline.

First of all, let's be clear - one of the hardest things about the Arizona recount story is actually getting coherent journalism out of it. Reporters have been systematically blocked from much relevant fact gathering, and only the most enterprising have been able to tease out valuable insight. Such insight, as it is, has all pointed in one direction: this thing is a mess, verging on a disaster.

Second of all, the sheer size and scope of the task has been misunderstood or underestimated almost all along. There are 2.1 million ballots cast in Maricopa County (62% of the state's population), and parts or all of 8 congressional districts. As I said, almost no county or election district elsewhere in the country has that volume of counting to accomplish. Almost any county of that size takes days, if not weeks, to fully report (New York City. Miami. Houston. Atlanta. Detroit. See a pattern?). Maricopa is, yes, the Parent County of Phoenix, so there's a city in there... but there's also the 13 smaller cities that have bloomed over the years around it. All of the Phoenix suburbs. The sprawl is absurd.

Of the 2.1 million ballots, officials overseeing the count say that 250,000 have been counted over 3 weeks. At that rate, according to the New York Times, it will take until August to complete the recount. The recount was scheduled to end this Friday. It's not at all clear Cyber Ninjas has enough staff - they have already asked for, and got, approval to add headcount to their counting staff... which is still a problem, since the Republicans, and the Ninjas, seem to be vetting potential counters for party affiliations (though apparently, not for things like, were you someone actually on the ballot, which caused them to fire a former legislator who was in the room for the first few days). 

Then there's cost. The Senate budgeted a laughable $150,000 towards the effort; the budget of the Maricopa County Election Board is in the millions. That's okay, though, no one believed you could bring in the count at that budget, and there are a number of wealthy donors throwing in money to complete it. But money and patience are not infinite. And at some point, soon, there will be growing pressure to ask just why costs keep spiraling and completion seems further and further away.

Of course, that's ignoring the absurd, crazy things the recount is supposed to assess: like are there ballots from Asia snuck into the count (hence the insane tales of searches for "bamboo" in the ballot paper), or did dead people vote (hint: if you voted, then died, you are not a dead person who voted... except you are).There were suggestions that staff would be calling or visiting voters at their homes (which, yes is a violation of voter intimidation laws... but again... what staff?). Because neither the Senate, nor the Ninjas, seem able to focus on specific examples of specific issues... every ballot is apparently being subjected to multiple inspections to check for every crazy accusation. Except no one is exactly sure if any of them are actually true.

More to the point... if there was any evidence of any truth to any potential accusation, we'd be hearing about it. The Cyber Ninjas specifically gave 24/7 video access to OANN, which has camera feeds monitoring every aspect of the recount (or so it is claimed). Even if OANN weren't primed to announce broadly and widely any discovery at a moment's notice (or conversely, if it's true OANN is broke, then maybe not), the right wing blogosphere and media are primed for proof Trump's crazy Big Lie fraud claims. They are desperate for anything that would bolster a joke argument the world refuses to take seriously. Yet, 3 weeks of work, 250,000 ballots examined... and nothing. Not a leak, not a suggestion of a counting anomaly. Nothing. No bamboo. No mysteriously dead voter. Nothing.

The only stories coming out of the recount are detail after detail describing just how half-assed, incompetent and potentially illegal the whole exercise is. Blue ink pens were handed out to counters... until someone pointed out it's illegal to use implements that could create new voter fraud. Observers were barred from the recount... until a judge had to step in and order permission for the media and outside observers. Boxes were mishandled and possibly double counted until errors were pointed out. The Justice Department says they're concerned about tampering. Maricopa County now says they're going to court to fight the Cyber Ninjas for the county's routers. And we have no idea what the Ninjas will or won't do to the servers that hold the electronic records of the original count.

As of May 14th, the whole recount has to be stopped because the Coliseum being used to hold it has another event coming in; it will be interesting to see just how every piece of the recount - never mind the pallets of those 2.1 million ballots, still in boxes - is stored and secured. But that's just details. What's truly insane, as of right now, is that this pointless, ridiculous exercise could be resumed, with no end in sight, for months.

And I'll just say it: for all the fears of some massively tampered, fictional account that Trump won with new numbers and trumped evidence of fraud... the real story here is likely to be one the right can neither spin nor talk their way out of: a badly inaccurate count that gives Biden more votes than the official count, no evidence of significant fraud (except, possibly, by the recount staff), and months of wasted time and costs that make further efforts in other cities and states prohibitively foolish. As crazy as it sounds, the best bet for many liberals is to let this farce play on and on until it plays itself into an embarrassing and very public truth: the whole recount fantasy is the biggest, and most wasteful piece yet of The Big Lie. And when they have to live that down, the right may very well have counted its way into the reckoning over the 2020 election that will truly wreck the whole show. And I am so totally here for it. Count on that.

A Change Is Gonna Come

While I'm generally not one to embrace the "waiting to exhale" metaphor of being African American in general... I have to admit. I heard the Derek Chauvin verdict and, well, I exhaled.

I'm not clear - haven't been, may not ever be - on why George Floyd affected this country as it did. It's easy, a little generic even to say "the video". We've had videos. We've been upset, Appalled, even. But George Floyd was... different.

It wasn't even the slow starting, but eventually thorough move to prosecute Chauvin (and his fellow officers... someday). No, what was different - what still has the ability to surprise me - is how Floyd's death and the protests that followed unblocked what had, in many cases, been years of lack of progress on many things, at many levels. Watching companies wholesale revamp policies and procedures. Hearing TV and film producers acknowledge and then take concrete steps to address systemic racism in casting and projects. Seeing all sorts of political conversations move to a whole other level of seriousness. I have been watching and discussing and writing about politics for a long, long time. And this past year, I can attest, is in many ways a thing I have never, ever seen in my lifetime.

And they found him guilty. And then I exhaled.

Chauvin's trial, at the very least, stands as the new prime example we can point to of how to get justice for policing right: whatever dismay I felt about Keith Ellison going into this effort, he made good on his promise to seek the appropriate justice: put the best prosecutors on the case. Assemble a compelling presentation of evidence. Anticipate the defense's pushback. And get police leadership to participate in acknowledging behavior that is simply out of bounds.

Unlike some, I continue to have deep admiration for Marcia Clark, and one thing she pointed out in her presentation of the OJ trial was how the prosecution went in and laid an unexpected story in chronological order: her first witness was a man walking his dog by Nicole's apartment, who heard noises and went to investigate. It was the start of establishing a timeline... one that, as she points out, became a bulletproof, uncontested demarcation of the events, and one which was deeply damaging to Simpson's claims of innocence.

Here too, the case against Chauvin started with a woman none of us had really seen: the gas station worker across the street, who, as it turned out, had the eyewitness seat for the start of Chauvin wrestling Floyd to the ground and pinning him there. She eventually took video, but as well, the gas station's camera, and a street camera were all introduced behind her testimony and laid out, before we'd seen the videos we all knew, the tragic sequence of events. And, per Clark, because of that gas station clerk, the defense was hemmed in well before they had even tried to discredit the bystanders on the other side of the street.

And I cry as I write this. I generally think the case was doomed for the defense once Donald Williams, the older man with martial arts experience, testified as to what he saw. When her broke down so thoroughly - as we all did - reliving that tape of that day, there was no coming back. He knew what he saw that day, and so did most of us. And once you know, you know.

Conservatives, faced with defending the literally indefensible, largely gave up. Fox refused to air courtroom coverage, despite the fact that obviously, America was watching. And at the end, rather than simply isolate Chauvin's guilt from everyone else ("lone bad actor" was a gift), Fox's most egregious types - Tucker, Jesse Watters, Greg Gutfeld - proclaimed that this was "caving to the mob" and "unfair to the police". In part, clearly, they understood that underlying this case was the long history of police misconduct against minorities, especially men, but hardly exclusively. But in part, that throwing up of hands elided the harder question they don't want to be asked - just what, exactly, was unfairly presented by the prosecution in that case? In more sober moments, even Fox lawyers and judicial experts (even Jeanine Pirro fer Chrissakes) admitted that the defense played a weak hand badly and evidence of guilt was fairly clear.

There are those who want a moment to solve everything, those for whom the exhale is not enough. I can't say, wouldn't begin to guess, that this Chauvin verdict is a world changer. A young woman was killed in Ohio the day of the verdict. A case in North Carolina is already going sideways. There's every chance that those conservative, pro police types will exert whatever backlash they can to slow or withstand progress. No, the point is smaller, and simpler, and just, well, what it is: we got Chauvin convicted. And for now, that alone will be the change we wanted. 

"the arc of history bends towards justice" is just that: the bending of a long line, away from the bad and towards the good. Thirty years after Rodney King, we have finally made it heard: the video shows what you think it shows. The bad cops in the videos are the problem. And that problem must be addressed. A change is gonna come. Something has already changed. It's not perfect, and no, it's not enough. But just for a minute, exhale. And let us catch our breath.

What's The Worst That Could Happen?

Being an optimist at heart, I do tend to look on the bright side. Writing about politics, even in a reduced way during the Trump era and even now, I try to find the glimmers of hope. I'd rather focus on what's possible, how we can get out of the worst of this, the signs of progress amidst the chaos and negativity.

But yes, things can get pretty negative.

I have friends and family - trust - who question my optimism. "Can't you see how bad it is? What if the worst should happen?" And yes, they have a point. From which I roundly return with bursts of additional optimism.

Still, it's a fair point in itself. Things are bad. They could get worse. We do owe it to ourselves to be honest about the fact that, rather than hopeful progress, this could all just be a way station on the downward slope. 

So, for my best friend, for today... here's some thoughts on the worst case scenario.

When I look at the potentials for disaster in politics and upcoming elections, I tend to focus my negative thinking on 3 things: misinformation, outright chicanery, and internal disarray on the left. Overarching all of that, right now, would be the pandemic. But that's also a separate discussion. For now, I'm focused on the really bad political possibilities:

• Misinformation - As much as I think Fox is flailing, let's be clear: on a day to day basis, Fox continues to distribute slanted, inaccurate information to viewers all too eager to snap up the lies and half truths. Tucker Carlson, as loathsome as he is, adroitly presents white supremacy in friendly, suburban tones meant to suggest that any and every prejudice and crazy idea counts as okay. And plenty of hardcore Trumpists have gone further - to Newsmax, OANN and God knows where on the internet to find the fuel for their hate. Add in Trump's new (however lame) "from the desk" website, and it's a bleak picture. We already know how these lies have worked to elect not just Trump, but a string of right wing extremists. We know that it works for them, and we know they're not stopping. And we do not know, really, that even accurate objective truth can stop it. On the left, we are using "finger in the dam" approaches to try and keep the misinformation contained, at best. This is not a solution, it's a tactic. And it's not working. And it's probably not enough.
• Chicanery - All props to Marc Elias, but right now it looks like "more hurt than skirt" on the various election laws being passed in the wake of Trump's loss. Complicated new rules, limited election times, surely attempts to limit access to voting booths this year and next... and that's before we dive into redistricting that, while not as bad as the gloomiest predictions, has room for Republicans to potentially make significant gains. Then, of course, there's the "never say lost" cycle of charges and recounts and silliness of Trump folks endlessly litigating the last election. All together, there is a foundation for setting up all new efforts to steal and otherwise fake a GOP win in 22 and/or 24. Republicans gaining back control of the federal legislative branch, however solid Biden is, could spell disaster. "Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy" is just chilling. More urgently, we may not survive another length of time with Mitch McConnell driving what's left of a working Senate into the ground... but never mind him, look at what would be there if he left. The Republican Party is broken, it's a zombie party... all the rest. But those broken down zombies could, with a few well timed wins, take our representative Democratic Republic with them as they go. And that reality should terrify us all.
• Disarray - This isn't "I'm concerned about Joe Manchin." At worst, Manchin is the canary in his own coal mine of what could easily get worse: you can't have infighting in a serious way until both sides declare war. Repeated, excessive intransigence from Manchin and other "moderates" that succeeds in riling up the Sanders/Warren et al hard left is when this gets really bad, as both sides offer up "my way or the highway" proposals that stop progress of any kind in its tracks. So far, Biden has shown a deft touch, and Schumer and Pelosi are masters of political 3 dimensional chess; but one can feel the slender threads holding all of this together, and sense that already some of them are snapping. We're not doomed yet. But if HR1 is officially dead, if police reform permanently stalls... what then? Will the student left be placated by "we can't just blow up the legislative filibuster?" Probably not. Or, worse, we blow up the filibuster... and still lose. Democrats losing the ability to speak in generally one voice, or to face voters with singular focus, is a moment waiting to happen. When it does... we may all have to face a leadership vacuum we've been trying to avoid with octogenarians and Stacy Abrams. And it won't be pretty.

Disarray plus chicanery times misinformation... the math is clearly there to signal serious trouble, should all bad things come to pass. Fake stories and doctored evidence of an Arizona recount. Failures to legislate the cause deep divisions among democrats. Redistricting that gerrymanders worse than ever. All of these, and much more, are certainly very real threats. So is a justice system that fails to appropriately bring rioters to justice, combined with a Supreme Court with a super majority that could not only stall fairness, but truly set it back further. 

This is the point where I usually say to my naysaying pals "that's a lot of bad news that all has to fall your way" as I try to remind folks that Trump and his merry band of incompetents can hardly master telling untruths with a straight face, never mind pull off a  massive interstate conspiracy designed to interfere with every level of our election process. But... to be fair, I'm the one who can't quite prove that it could all go our way. There's plenty of reasonable, not that far fetched, scenarios that end very badly for democrats, the rule of law, free and fair elections and our system of justice. And that's not, in any sense, good news.

There's a lot of bad that could happen. The worst case scenario is definitely out there, it's not implausible, or even unlikely, depending on what you see. It's a fair point to wonder why we should hope for anything, and if we abandon hope, it's fair, I think, to see a lot of potential trouble dead ahead. I have no "but" to put in here, no little ray of Mary Sunshine to cheer this up, no "I'm just a cockeyed optimist" to sing you to comforting sleep. The nightmare scenario is a real nightmare, one we could really face. If that scares into you getting up and doing something... well, good. Let's hope that's not too late. Because god knows, it could really be as bad as my pessimistic friends want to believe.

Leaving Liz

Supporting Liz Cheney is an essentially painless exercise for any Democrat. It costs us nothing, it has no calories, and no one, not for one second, thinks we actually want Liz Cheney to do anything but be a thorn in Republicans side.

That's because Liz is terrifying.

Oh sure, we don't like to talk about it... now, anyway. But Liz is tough and hard edged and scary and she knows it and we all know she's like that because that's what she was taught. She's the warmonger's warmonger. She's the Red Scare's Red Scare. (And via her mom, she's The Iron Lady's Iron Lady.) It's why Liz was elected to leadership - she's a woman, she's got clear connections to everything her Death Star building father still runs with a private cabal, and she scares the bejeezus out of everyone, but especially Democrats. Look at her, standing there behind Kevin McCarthy, lips pursed and a thousand mile stare of disapproval. "All of these pantywaists disappoint me," one imagines her thinking. "Things will be much different when I'm finally in charge."

And for anyone who thinks that next week's vote to replace her will slow or quash those plans... think again. (And then go rewatch Dick)

You may think it's remarkable that she's stuck to her guns (now there's a phrase Liz owns: "she stuck to her guns" could go on her tombstone), but why would she not? Donald Trump is just about everything she despises in people, never mind Republicans - he's weak, he lies, he thinks he deserves all the power... need I go on? Liz believes things, believes in things. Truth. Justice. The American Way. Her unfettered access to global power. At a moment when liars and thieves and morally bankrupt sycophants hijacked her party, Liz stood firm. Because that's what she does. And frankly. that's what Republicans used to stand for. So who's wrong here?

I kid (a little), but here's the thing: Democrats supporting Liz Cheney is mischievous in its way, but she's right and so are we: truth matters. The lies matter. Liz has already made it clear: she's going to see her leadership post taken away and she's not going to stand in the way of other people's downward spiral. But Liz has power and Liz has weight and she's making her removal vote explicitly a choice to back Trump and The Big Lie. And it will stick, and it will work, and her bet that they'll lose (that is, the weak people too scared to see she's right) will happen and one day, not too far away, she will be standing when all else has fallen.

I'm with her. One doesn't expect bravery, or intelligent good sense from a Kevin McCarthy... but some of these people simply know better and are too scared to do what's right. Elise Stefanik isn't dumb, but she is letting her ambition and her willingness to pander to Trump's worst impulses overwhelm her own good sense. This is the thing about a male dominated system - it makes it hard for women to stick together. Liz knows that all too well. It's every man for himself, and if Elise has to pay for this, then one day, she will. Stefanik has had a nice run as a canny outsider willing to mouth off to power. But deep scrutiny and a starring role achieved through a good old fashioned knife in the back probably won't look great on her. She's not ready to play the kind of role Liz played, Harvard degree or no. And that's the kind of thing you know when you're Liz.

True, Liz isn't warm or fuzzy; it's her Achilles heel, the thing that's made it hard for her to succeed as a retail politician. It took a while to win statewide, even in Wyoming, and the right combination of warmer and pandering to oil money could knock her off... but she's awfully good at the latter herself. Trump may yet get his wish to destroy her congressional career by bigfooting her House race; but it's short sighted and a waste of time and resources. Cheney is reliably Republican (that's how you get into leadership), and the seat is ridiculously safe. A Donald Trump who spends enormous amounts of time and money crushing Liz Cheney is a guy who misses the fact that you could lose Liz and wind up with nothing to show for it: a House without Liz where Republicans are still in the minority is a House where Democrats will have an easier time taking control. Liz is the one who can actually, thoughtfully fight most liberal policy ideas, with her tough comments, and yes, that thousand yard stare. They need that. Desperately.

So go ahead, Republicans. Defuse your own best nuclear weapon. Denude yourselves of the toughness and experience and canny ability to speak plainly and honestly about the things you used to hold most dear. Take out Liz Cheney for nothing more than refusing to join the Big Lie and worship at the (spray painted) golden door to Mar A Lago. In exchange you get several used golf courses, some aging bottle blondes in spike heels... and the loss of anything like your dignity and good sense.You leave Liz at your own peril. But not ours.

 

Ban Me

The idea that it was a difficult or hard to predict decision to keep Donald Trump off Facebook is indicative of a problem that liberals (and everyone else, really) have when dealing with the lingering nonsense he provides: this isn't hard, we know we're right and let's just keep him away from having the chance to repeat the nightmare we lived from 2016 to 2020.

Who cares if Republicans are so internally broken as the last gasp of a political party that they can't extricate themselves from his malign influence? Who cares if "his base" must be catered to by fearful politicians bereft of ideas or independent thoughts? Why should we pay an attention to his ridiculous website, a desperate plea for relevance where he continues to blather away his incomprehensible mix of self aggrandizement, endless animus and fear of irrelevance? 

We owe him nothing.

Democrats, I swear, know this. on good days, we respond calmly and confidently to the remaining nonsense, clear in our understanding that we're right, he's wrong, and his sycophants are a minority voice that should be ignored (or in the case of his riotous mob, tried and imprisoned). We won the presidency, held a house majority and regained control of the Senate because his lies, malfeasance and corruption were simply unbearable. 

But still, like the post divorce remnants of a dysfunctional marriage, the bad man still has the power to undermine that confidence at the oddest moments. "What if he gets back on Facebook?" fretted media types. Kara Swisher - in what was surely the most embarrassing moment she's ever had and I've ever seen Maddow cater to - asserted, literally absent any relevant fact, that his return was all but a certainty (which she, quite soundly, had to retract the next morning). Even now, reporters bring up gloomy, doom filled predictions that all is lost in 2022 elections because a handful of democrats are considering running for different offices, and one woman (Cheri Bustos) has decided to retire (from, it should be noted, what is widely considered a safe seat). Because, of course... how can we possibly feel good, even for a moment, that the worst is over?

Look, I get it. Redistricting will be tough and nothing is certain. But still. Even the initial census results were hardly the bloodbath that had been foreordained, and indeed, the census, while troubled with pandemic issues, looks like a reasonably on track demographic assessment of the nation as a whole. Trump is spending time largely feeling sorry for himself, playing golf, puttering around his overpriced and ridiculous mansion cum private club, preparing to plop himself down into similarly cosseted digs in mid New Jersey, all the while whining about feeling hard done by. And sure, ambitious Republicans with no shame and less sense are catering to his whims and flying to his side to kiss the ring... but nothing, really nothing, suggests that this bowing and scraping is doing more than feeding Trump's foolish ego and putting the entire party on a crash course to oblivion.

Take Liz Cheney - or as Kevin McCarthy would add, "please." Cheney's principled and genuinely honorable insistence on speaking truth to foolishness may well kill her current chances at moving upward, but she has a point: perpetuating Trump's "Big Lie" about the election, trying to use falsehoods about made up frauds and ballot box stuffing will only damage the credibility of individuals and the group as a whole. Even now, Trump is braying from his little corner of the internet (anyone can make a website) his string of lies and misinformation of imaginary election issues. And trying to ignore the Trump in the room and run the usual ugly oppositional efforts to destroy Dem chances is unlikely to gather much traction either while Mr. Country Club can up-end the conversation with a few words. McConnell was, and remains, right in his end of term assessment: either Trump is removed from future influence, or Republicans have a problem. And he's their problem. Not ours.

I'm not saying that the Facebook - or the Oversight Board, if that's what you want, Mark - decision isn't news or a topic to discuss. It's more how we discuss it than the fact we discuss it at all. If we are done with Trump - and we are, not just "Lord knows we should be" - then let's be done. Let's be clear that he has no place in the national discourse. Let's remind ourselves, consistently and explicitly, that he continues to lie, misrepresent and insult everything that is worthy or worth holding onto in our serious discussions of national governance. Let us be clear what his sycophants, and parrots, and media enablers are, and how they should be treated - as the facilitators and enablers of damaging lies and destructive elements to our body politic. This isn't war, conservatives are not the enemy. But Donald Trump is a malignant, dangerous force against our democracy, and we calmly, and confidently, repudiate him, his followers, and all that he stands for.

This isn't hard. And we're not wrong. And there's no need for doubt or fear. We get this. Facebook gets this. Twitter gets this. Let's act like the fact that we get this means we know what we're doing. Because we do. And he is done.