zPSA: Donald Trump is Fucking Up

Elected Democrats have been doing a piss-poor job communicating to the American people despite the political gifts handed to them lately.  Their first instinct is always to pussy-foot around an issue, both-sides it a little bit to avoid offending anyone, and use 5,000 words when five would do.  They're also afraid of sounding crass, or being assholes, and if they ever swore it wouldn't sound authentic.

For example, Hakeem Jefferies recently offered the opinion that “Tariffs, when properly utilized, have a role to play in trying to make sure that you have a competitive environment for our workers and our businesses.  That’s not what’s going on right now. This is a reckless economic sledgehammer that Donald Trump and compliant Republicans in the Congress are taking to the economy, and the American people are being hurt enough.”

"Utilized"?  Really?  Who talks like that?  "I utilized some toilet paper to blow my nose because we're all out of Kleenex.  Good thing we had the TP otherwise I would have utilized my finger."  Sounds perfectly normal and relatable.  And more importantly, why is he providing cover for Trump's tariffs?  Why couldn't he just say "Trump's tariffs ruined the economy"?

Everyone who reads G:TB knows that I have an inordinate fondness for Cory Booker, but did he really have to talk for 25 hours to draw attention to DJ Trump's stupidity?  He couldn't boil it down to maybe 25 minutes?  Does anyone know what Booker actually said?  I don't.

Trump is fucking up and someone needs to call him out in a way that resonates with people who were stupid enough to vote for Trump in the first place.

You know what this moment calls for?  Someone who can swear and be crass authentically, for whom being an asshole comes naturally.  Like Chris Christie, only not a big fat slob who sold out to Trump and did a 180 only after being dumped from Trumpworld.

I think the Democrats need to cut an ad with someone well-known and well-respected from outside the world of politics and run it throughout the NBA playoffs.  It needs to use short, pithy sentences.  It needs to be overly reductive and devoid of nuance so that Trump and his supporters need to babble like Democrats to try to explain it away.  The ad's point needs to be clear even if you can't hear it because you're watching in a sports bar.  It should feature someone who has represented America on the world stage, who achieved major wins, and who has fucked up epically.  This person could then say "I have represented our country on the world stage.  I know a lot about winning, and I know about fucking up.  I'm here to tell you: Trump is fucking up."  And that's the theme.  Four words.  Trump is fucking up.  Bleep the "fucking" if you have to but don't blur the speaker's mouth.

Then really quickly have them say something like "The Trump tariffs tanked the stock market.  Since he took office the market is down about 9%.  That means Trump's tariffs took one out of every eleven dollars in your savings.  Trump is fucking up."  Run video of Trump talking on one side of the screen while the stock ticker plummets on the other.

They could also say "Trump promised to deport illegal aliens.  But his own lawyers admitted that they accidentally deported the wrong guy.  So the illegals are still here and the wrong guys are in El Salvador.  Trump is fucking up."  At the same time, run video of Kristi Noem rocking her ICE cap, flak vest and Daytona.

Then they conclude with "I know a lot about winning and this isn't it.  Trump is fucking up."

My first thought was Michael Phelps.  He represented the US at the Olympics, he won more than anyone ever, and he got into a bit of a jam with a bong.  So when he says "I have represented our country on the world stage.  I know a lot about winning, and I know about fucking up," the ad would run a picture of him on an Olympic podium with the flag, then a picture of him with a shitload of medals, then the photo of him and the bong.  

Everyone knows Phelps.  Many people like him, or at least respect him.  I don't think anyone hates him.  Apparently he dislikes Trump and he strikes me as having some assholery in him, but I don't know how authentically he swears.  This seems like a good option though.

My next thought was Tiger Woods.  When he says "I have represented our country on the world stage.  I know a lot about winning, and I know about fucking up," the ad would run a picture of him holding the Ryder Cup, then a bunch of iconic pictures of him with trophies and/or fist-pumping, then ... well, there are probably a lot of fucking up photos to choose from but I'll just go with his mugshot.

But Tiger is friends with Trump so he wouldn't go for this.

I was stuck after Tiger.  I ruminated and finally struck on an amazing idea.  You know who can take on a raging asshole from Queens?  Another raging asshole from Queens, one who famously swears and acts badly but won a lot and who put representing America above almost everything else. 

Like John fucking McEnroe.  Johnny Mac viewed representing the US in Davis Cup play as a holy grail and he did more for the US Davis Cup team than just about anyone.  He won 77 titles on the tour including seven majors.  And he was famously thrown out of the Australian Open for cursing out an umpire.

Everyone knows him, I think he's generally respected, and he likes to smoke weed and shit on Trump.

And he has a great story about how his father, also named John McEnroe, sent Trump a letter in 2015 and Trump thought it was from the tennis star.

Anyway, I'm sure there are plenty of other candidates to star in my PSA.  I invite you to nominate some in the comments.  But please hurry because the Democrats can't get out of their own way.

Economics and the Second Amendment - Redux 2025

I'm pulling a Grover Cleveland with one of my better G:TB posts because it's particularly relevant these days.  DJ Trump, who also pulled a Grover Cleveland, is not at all Gheorghe and does not read G:TB--if he did he would know that tariffs act as a tax and wouldn't have screwed up our 401(k)s.  I have Marls and Jamboni drafting a complaint right now, let us know if you want in.

DJ Trump recently announced that he will impose tariffs of 25% and 10% on imported steel and aluminum, respectively. The Dow dropped 350 points in response. Naturally, I plan to sue the President.

This isn't my idea--he had it first. Back in December 2017, Trump twat the following in response to a 350 point drop in the Dow:

People who lost money when the Stock Market went down 350 points based on the False and Dishonest reporting of Brian Ross of @ABC News (he has been suspended), should consider hiring a lawyer and suing ABC for the damages this bad reporting has caused - many millions of dollars!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 3, 2017

I'm not sure what the exact cause of action against the President would be. Surely not negligence. If the President can't be guilty of obstructing justice how should I expect to be made whole for acts of mere Executive stupidity?

I think my best claim is infringement of my Second Amendment rights. Let me explain.

I went to arguably the most conservative law school in the country. Before classes started I was encouraged to read "Principles of Economics" by N. Gregory Mankiw, an economics professor at Harvard who was chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under George W. Bush. I actually enjoyed the book and I dredged it up for this post.

Here's how Mankiw explains tariffs:

The increased price of foreign goods under the tariff allows domestic firms to increase their price, thus resulting in overproduction. The increased price also results in underconsumption. Consumers (i.e., everyone who isn't involved with the manufacture of steel and who isn't the government) loses the benefit of quandrangle C, D, E, and F. This because the government reaps rectangle E and manufacturers take trapezoid C. If your eyes haven't glazed over at this point, you realize that the entire market--everyone involved in this situation--loses the benefit of triangles D and F. Thus triangles D and F are a deadweight loss--absent the tariff, D and F would have been consumer surplus. Instead no one had D and F. Thus the tariff acts as a tax. And these triangles are the direct result of the aforementioned overproduction/underconsumption. This jumped out at me 15 years ago. Seriously, look at my notes in the margin.

This is important because conservatives abhor deadweight loss--when Kudlow, Laffer and Moore are against an economic policy you know it isn't conservative. And if that doesn't convince you, the fact that Democrats and unions support the tariffs should.

I personally dislike the tariffs because as Mankiw explains "When a country allows trade and becomes an importer of a good, domestic consumers of the good are better off, and domestic producers of the good are worse off. Trade raises the economic well-being of a nation in the sense that the gains of the winners exceed the losses of the losses of the losers."

Does that last sentence sound familiar? It probably does. Conservatives always say that the government shouldn't pick winners and losers. Here's what Paul Ryan has to say about this:

Elites in Washington should NOT be picking winners & losers—that’s a recipe for a closed economy—for cronyism.https://t.co/AcHJfVRwTE

— Paul Ryan (@SpeakerRyan) July 28, 2016

Of course, Ryan also applauded Trump's move that helped keep Carrier's plant in Wisconsin. Cronyism indeed!

Anyway, the upshot of this tariff is that it will cost more to manufacture things that are made out of steel (and aluminum). This added cost will, of course, be passed along to the consumer. So expect to see an increase in the price of appliances, silverware, steel-belted radial tires, beer cans, cans of beer, cars and car parts, BBQ grills, BBQ grilling utensils, wire, pots and pans, foil, golf clubs, patio furniture, fencing, fencing swords, plumbing supplies, building supplies, nails, screws, brads, tacks, nuts, bolts, washers, garbage cans, bicycles, ladders, window frames, and mattress springs.

And things like guns and bullet shells. The President's steel tariff is really a tax on guns and bullets, making it more expensive for me to exercise my god-given Second Amendment right to bear arms. "Shall not be infringed" goddammit! I'm suing! And while I'm at it I'm going to claw back the money I lost in my 401(k) just like Trump said I should three months ago.

zbouillabiase: Political Natterings

I haven't posted anything in a long time and I don't have anything particular cogent to say, although I've seen a few interesting pieces of political news recently.

First, the New York Times and other major media outlets reported that a parasitic worm ate a portion of RFK Jr.'s brain and then died there.  Lest you assert "this is lamestream media bias against the antivaxx crowd!!" I direct you to the portion of the article that quotes deposition testimony given by RFK Jr. in which he said that doctors determined than an abnormality seen in his brain scan "was caused by a worm that got into my brain and ate a portion of it and then died."  More succinctly, he testified under oath that he had a dead worm in his brain.  He further testified "I have cognitive problems, clearly," and "I have short-term memory loss, and I have longer-term memory loss that affects me."  In response to the article, RFK Jr. twat (xeeted?) "I offer to eat 5 more brain worms and still beat President Trump and President Biden in a debate."  So he admits the whole worm thing.  And he had mercury poisoning too, which also doesn't bode well for his overall health or his cognition.

Apparently you get worms in your brain by eating undercooked pork, which can carry tapeworms.  Typically the tapeworm larvae wind up in your intestines but sometimes they get lost and wind up in your brain.

Once there, they eat your brain but I guess that isn't what they're supposed to nosh on so they die and your body naturally walls them off, forming cysts.  Like this.

Just to be clear, you don't want that.  All this tapeworm talk reminds me of Irvine Welsh's novel Filth which is partially narrated by the main character's tapeworm.  I've been reading more of his stuff lately (once I get used to reading in a Scottish accent I keep going so I don't have to reacclimatize) and it's all good.  My two favorite recent passages are "I was differently made: at his age I had testicles as vicious and hairy as the heads of two ferrets" (from Dead Men's Trousers) and "Terry gave thanks for all those years of excessive beer-drinking and takeaways.  Without them he would have fallen to certain death.  A lesser man, body honed on exercise and diet rather than sloth, indolence and abuse would be dead by now, he reflected.  A lesser man." (from Glue).

Second, Donald Trump is running his reelection campaign like a goddamned gangster.  And I don't mean "gangster" euphemistically, I mean it literally.  He has family all over "this thing of ours."  First he installed his daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, as co-chair of the RNC.  This makes it easier for him to divert super PAC money to his pay legal bills.  Second, he plans on making Uday and Qusay Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump "loyalty czars" in his next administration.  This means he will only appoint and hire people who pledge complete fealty to DJ Trump.  Third, he got 18-year-old Barron Trump named as an at-large delegate for Florida in the Republican national convention.  

What do all of these people have in common?  They're family, which means they will always be loyal.  You can never lose your family.

Finally, Trump's Veepstakes competition is well underway.  All sorts of seemingly important people are willing to debase themselves on national television for a shot at being on the ticket.  Kristi Noem shot her way out of contention, but there's still plenty of chatter around JD Vance, Marco Rubio, Doug Burgum, and Tim Scott.  Like I said in 2016, "he's running his campaign on some next-level reality TV competition three-steps-ahead shit."  So it won't be any of those jackals.

Trump needs to win this thing to stay out of jail, and he needs to stay in office for the full four years so he can run again in 2028.  There's only one way out of office once he's in (assuming the Big Macs don't get him in his sleep).  He's clearly unimpeachable--he literally staged a coup and suffered no consequences in the Senate.  All he has to worry about is section 4 of the 25th Amendment, which says in part:

Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.

The key here is that the 25th Amendment can only be triggered if the VP signs on.  In order to boot the Prez, you need the Veep.  There is absolutely positively no fucking way in hell that Donald Trump is going to give anyone the opportunity to shiv him in the back unless that person is a rock-solid reliable supplicant.  And that has to be family.  Maybe Tomax or Xamot Junior or Eric, but they're both morons and The Don knows it.  I think that means Ivanka, Jared, or Kimberly Guilfoyle.  

You're probably saying "No way! No one go for want this!" to which I reply "Oh really?"  Think about all the shit DJ Trump pulled over the past 77 years.  You think the people who are willing to tolerate that won't tolerate some nepotism on the bottom of the ticket?

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You don't think DJT would love to roll out "TRUMP/TRUMP" campaign signs?

You heard it here first.  Trump/Trump or Trump/Guilfoyle 2024.

Colin Allred Wants to Make Texas Blue

 Colin Allred played in 32 games for the Tennessee Inbreds Titans from 2007 to 2010, recording 46 tackles, 0 sacks and 0 interceptions.  Pro-football-reference.com gives him a career AV of 2.  

His post-football career is more impressive.  He got his JD at Berkeley then worked for Julian Castro at HUD.  Now he represents Texas's 32nd district (Dallas and some suburbs) in the US House of Representatives.  And he gives a great interview:

Now he's running to unseat Ted Cruz as the senator from Texas.

I’m running for U.S. Senate because Texans deserve a Senator whose team is Texas. Ted Cruz only cares about himself.

Join our campaign today: https://t.co/2dROrrQrPV pic.twitter.com/9iz9yu1rFb

— Colin Allred (@ColinAllredTX) May 3, 2023

And he has a convincing pitch: Ted Cruz sucks.  No one will argue with that.  

Ted Cruz beat Beto O'Rourke by 215,000 votes despite the fact that Beto said he is in favor of taking guns from people which is the least Texan thing you can say.  Seems to me that Allred only has to say "I played football at Baylor and in the NFL, and you can keep your guns" to pick up those necessary votes.  What's more Texan than that?  

I'll tell you what!  During the January 6 riots, Allred texted his wife to tell her he loves her, then took off his jacket and tie and prepared to fight the mob with a stanchion.  Ted Cruz retreated to a broom closet (and he wasn't pulling a Boris Becker, he was hiding).  Eventually he came out of the closet and went to Cancun.

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So I'm calling this race for Allred.  Of course, I'm the idiot who thought Cory Booker had a convincing presidential pitch so what do I know.  

Gheorghe Explains the 2020 Democratic Primary

It's been a while since Gheorghe explained the election. Here are many hot takes on the 2020 Democratic primary broken down by candidate.

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The candidate: Bernie Sanders

His campaign in a sentence: free healthcare, free medicine, free college, free citizenship, and a union card for everyone

His campaign in a GIF:

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Liked by: people who don’t have and can’t afford the aforementioned stuff

Disliked by: people who have the aforementioned stuff and don’t want to have to pay for other people to get it

Trump’s nickname if he gets the nomination: Bolshevik Bernie; Bernie Panders

How Trump will beat him: Trump will terrify many people with rants about socialism and communism and how Bernie will destroy the "big beautiful economy" Trump alleges to have built. Trump will run this video again and again and again:



Parenthetically, Bernie Sanders was 46 years old in 1988 yet he looked 78. We should all feel better about ourselves, or at least our appearances relative to middle-aged Bernie.

Trump will also yell words like "Sandinistas" and "Oretega" and "Castro" not only because Bernie backed them, but because it will tie him to Latin America and thus further enrage Trump's xenophobic base. Also, Putin will interfere on Trump’s behalf.

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The candidate: Pete Buttigieg

His campaign in a sentence: I am more intelligent and poised than your other options

His campaign in a GIF:

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Liked by: people who look at him and are reminded of the aloof but still likable valedictorian of their elite undergraduate university

Disliked by: people who did not go to an elite undergraduate university; people who went to an elite undergraduate university and did not find their aloof valedictorian to be likable

Trump’s nickname if he gets the nomination: Gayor Pete; some bad pun involving “Butt”

How Trump will beat him: This will be ugly. Trump unabashedly ran on racism and xenophobia in 2016. If Buttigieg gets the nomination Trump will expand his platform to include homophobia. Trump will say things like “Can you imagine this guy negotiating with Putin? Vlad would have his way with him! And you know what, Pete would like that!” Or “Kim Jong-Un would have Pete on his knees in seconds [waits a beat] and Pete is probably looking forward to it!” Buttigieg’s military service will carry no weight. GHW Bush, Bob Dole, John Kerry, and John McCain were all decorated combat veterans. All but Bush earned a Purple Heart. They also all lost presidential elections. No one cares about military service anymore. Also, Putin will interfere on Trump’s behalf.

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The candidate: Mike Bloomberg

His campaign in a sentence: I can beat Trump because I’m a New Yorker; also, I have $61 billion with which to bludgeon you into voting for me

His campaign in a GIF:

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Liked by: people who have been bludgeoned into submission by $61 billion worth of advertising; people from the New York area who work in the financial services industry; people who think it takes a thief to catch a thief

Disliked by: people who don’t want to see another egomaniacal New York billionaire with no real party affiliation buy the presidency; people who look at Bloomberg’s record of mistreating minorities and women and see a bizarro Trump

Trump’s nickname if he gets the nomination: Stop N Frisk Mike; Mikey NDA

How Trump will beat him: Trump will gaslight voters (again) into thinking that Bloomberg will be “a disaster” for minorities and women, while Trump will be their champion. Also, Putin will interfere on Trump’s behalf.

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The candidate: Joe Biden

His campaign in a sentence: I was Barack Obama’s VP!

His campaign in a GIF:

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Liked by: people with little imagination

Disliked by: people who look at Biden and see a very old man who may be in cognitive decline

Trump’s nickname if he gets the nomination: Dopey Joe, Slidin’ Biden

How Trump will beat him: Trump will gaslight voters (again) into thinking that Obama (and thus Biden) destroyed the economy while Trump unleashed it like the Kraken. Then he will sit back while Biden says and does stupid shit and shoots himself in the foot. Also, Putin will interfere on Trump’s behalf.

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The candidate: Amy Klobuchar

Her campaign in a sentence: I'm a nice midwesterner with a record of centrism and electability so you should like me, please please like me

Her campaign in a GIF:

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Liked by: Does anyone really affirmatively like her?

Disliked by: Does anyone really affirmatively dislike her?

Trump’s nickname if she gets the nomination: Shaky Amy

How Trump will beat her: In an early debate zdaughter turned to me and asked about Klobuchar "Why is she so shaky?" It's a good question. Maybe she's nervous, maybe she has a neurological issue, maybe she uses too much hairspray. All I know is it's a weakness so apparent my 5-year-old saw it so Trump will pounce on it and exploit it for all it's worth. He will say a bunch of misogynistic stuff too. Also, Putin will interfere on Trump’s behalf.

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The candidate: Elizabeth Warren

Her campaign in a sentence: I have a pompous lecture for every issue

Her campaign in a GIF:

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Liked by: people who enjoy pompous lectures

Disliked by: people who don’t like to be lectured

Trump’s nickname if she gets the nomination: Pocahontas, Lyin' Lizzie

How Trump will beat her: His answer to every debate question will be “She lied about her race to get ahead!” or he’ll just yell “Pocahontas!” over and over. Candidly I have no idea how Warren has skated on this issue for so long. I think it’s an egregious misrepresentation. Also, Putin will interfere on Trump’s behalf.

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You know who the best candidate was on paper?

The candidate: Cory Booker

What his campaign should have been in a sentence: I have an Ivy League degree and a Rhodes scholarship like Pete, mayoral experience like Pete and Mike and Bernie, senatorial experience like Joe and Bernie and Amy and Liz, a progressive record on guns and the environment, a pro-business record when it comes to the economy, a realistic healthcare plan, and I know how to relate to minority voters because I really am a minority; also, I played Pac-10 football, I'm dating Rosario Dawson, and Trump can't pull his "I'm more manly than you" bully bullshit with me because I'm bigger and stronger and much younger than him and I would absolutely fuck him up if he stepped to me.

What his campaign should have been in a GIF:

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Liked by: apparently no one

Disliked by: I don't know anyone who affirmatively dislikes him

Trump’s nickname if he gets the nomination: Cory Crooker in an attempt to tie him to corruption in Newark

How Trump will beat him: He already did.

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Ultimately I really truly believe that Trump will lose in November no matter his opponent. Despite all my foregoing snark, I think that voters will be highly motivated in PA, WI, OH, and MI (which appear to be the only states that matter because they are the only ones that could go either way) and I have to imagine that they are picking up what the Democrats are putting down, namely lots of free stuff, income equality, a return to sanity and normalcy, etc. Trump ran on populism but it isn't clear to me that these four states are any better off than they were in 2016, and Bloomberg and Steyer will hopefully dip deeply into their fortunes to get the vote out. So keep your chins up!

Maltese Millennial Falcon

I work with a bright young enthusiastic guy who likes to talk about politics and international affairs. He handed me a copy of "Shortest Way Home" by Pete Buttigieg and told me I had to read it. So I did. You should too.

Pete Buttigieg (pronounced "boot-edge-edge," apparently it's the most common last name in Malta) is the mayor of South Bend. He was the valedictorian and senior class president of his high school in South Bend, then he went to Harvard and Oxford on a Rhodes Scholarship, then he worked at McKinsey and volunteered on various Democratic campaigns. He eventually came home to South Bend and became the mayor. This all happened in the first 29 years of his life.

He turned 37 in January and he's running for President. If he wins he could, in theory, become a retired two-term president by the time he's 45. I'll be 45 in twenty days.

Buttigieg is openly gay. He came out after he became the mayor and was reelected with 80% of the vote. Notably this happened in Indiana while Mike Pence was governor. Apparently Buttigieg just gets shit done and his constituents dig it.

I enjoyed his book so much that I listened to some interviews with him and he's really damn impressive. He's progressive but pragmatic. His approach reminds me of a good mediator--start any negotiation with areas upon which both sides can agree, work through those areas to build trust and cooperation between the groups, and then build on that success to address more contentious issues collaboratively.

For example, everyone agrees that we need freedom, democracy, and security. Different people might view those three concepts differently, but if we can find niches in those areas that both sides of the aisle agree on we might make progress in ways that please a lot of people.

Buttigieg has a some hints of Marco Rubio to him. His delivery is really smooth and not clearly rehearsed, but once you've heard him a few times you'll hear the same lines again and again. He also has Rubio's youthful appearance and gameshow host haircut. Buttigieg has at least 50 IQ points on Rubio though and he seems genuine.

When asked how someone so young could have enough experience to be President, Buttigieg notes that he has more government experience than the current President; more executive experience than Mike Pence; and more military experience than any president since George H.W. Bush (he was deployed in Afghanistan for 7 months as a reservist).



His time at McKinsey taught him how to mine data and he's a Millennial so he naturally embraces technology. So, for example, he worked with Notre Dame to develop Wi-Fi enabled valves in the sewer system and now the St. Joseph river doesn't get flooded with Golden Domer shits after a rain storm. He also addressed South Bend's abandoned house problem through smarts, creativity and lots of elbow grease, resulting in the remediation or demolition of 1000 houses in 1000 days.

Ultimately I think he's too young to get the nomination but I think he's a great VP pick--smart, young, mid-western, full of energy and ideas. Like a gay Paul Ryan circa 2008, only he cares about other people and has principles beyond tax cuts for the uber rich. Biden/Buttigieg 2020 rolls off the tongue and I would love to watch him debate Pence.

In fact, I'd love to watch him debate anyone and in order for that to happen he needs to get donations of any size from 65,000 different people. I encourage you to spend a buck to get him on the main debate stage. We're all better off with more smart people running and sharing ideas.

Don't take my word for it, read his book. Or listen to this old podcast if you're too lazy to read.

Political Natterings

1. The Tyranny of the Minority

The Democratic nominee has won six of the last seven presidential elections, but a Republican president has filled four of the last six Supreme Court vacancies. As a result, the makeup of the Supreme Court doesn't necessarily reflect the views of the electorate and this will likely be exacerbated now that only 51 Senators are required to approve a nominee. California makes up 12.14% of the US population. That's roughly equal to the combined populations of Iowa, Utah, Arkansas, Nevada, Mississippi, Kansas, New Mexico, Nebraska, West Virginia, Idaho, Hawaii, New Hampshire, Maine, Rhode Island, Montana, Delaware, South Dakota, North Dakota, Alaska, Vermont, and Wyoming. But when it comes time to vote on Supreme Court justices, California only has two votes, just like each of those little states. This might have made sense back in 1790, when the biggest state (Virginia) was only 11.7 times the size of the smallest state (Delaware), but it seems unworkable today when California is 68.2 times the size of Wyoming. My solution? Amend the Constitution so that the House votes on Supreme Court confirmations instead of the Senate. If we're going to turn this process into a political shitshow, at least make it more equitable from a representation perspective.

2. I love Richard Linklater

I will always have a soft spot for Richard Linklater because he made "Dazed and Confused." Then he went and made this ad:



Now I'm in love. Bigger Linklater fans than I will recognize this character from the movie "Bernie."



3. Steve Carell as Donald Rumsfeld?!?

Christian Bale as Dick Cheney? Sure. Sam Rockwell as George W. Bush? Fine. But Steve Carell as Donald Rumsfeld?!? No way. Carell is supposed to play me when they make my biopic (he'll have to ditch his hair plugs). No way he can pull off Rumstud.

Gheorghe Explains the Election: Trump's VP Pick

It's a foregone conclusion that Donald Trump will be the Republican nominee come November. This is surprising at first blush, but not so much when you look at his closest competitors.



Also surprising at first blush was Chris Christie's decision to endorse Trump. Shortly before he dropped out of the race, Christie used the Marls voice to mockingly impersonate Trump.



Pundits have posited that Christie made this move with the hopes of getting the vice presidential nod. I don't see that happening.

Picking a vice president is difficult. For example, about 25 years ago a man named Bush was running for president as a Republican. At the time the GOP was perceived as being less than welcoming to minorities, so he apparently considered making Colin Powell his veep. Chris Rock explained why he didn't--someone would try to kill Bush so that Powell would be the first black president. So instead he went with Dan Quayle, probably because no one on earth would kill Bush to put Quayle in the big seat. Parenthetically, despite being a remarkably reasonable pick for president, Bush lost to someone named Clinton largely because an upstart billionaire lunatic with no elected experience decided to make a self-funded run for the presidency. It was a completely different world back then.

Although Christie isn't wildly popular, most rational people would prefer a President Christie over a President Trump. So if Christie got the veep nod, then politicians from both sides of the aisle would do anything they could to impeach The Donald. Trump knows this (he's running his campaign on some next-level reality TV competition three-steps-ahead shit) so his VP pick will be even less appealing than he is, but will still bring in some extra votes that Trump doesn't already have. Who might that be?

1. Sarah Palin

She already endorsed Trump and will help get some of the Cruz/Tea Party/maniac vote that Trump doesn't already have. She has that whole mavericky outsider thing going on and could theoretically help remediate Trump's image with women. No one would do anything to kill or depose Trump so that Palin could move up--that's a frying-pan-to-fire situation. Her downside is that she already destroyed a GOP nominee's campaign.

2. David Duke

No one will kill Trump to put Duke in charge. A Trump/Duke ticket would lock up 99.999% of the racist/xenophobe vote, practically guaranteeing that most if not all of Cruz's and Rubio's anti-immigrant base will vote Trump. A Trump/Duke ticket would also repulse all of the non-white vote, as well as all voters with humanity and conscience. Seems like a longshot but then again, nothing makes sense this election cycle.

3. Arnold Schwarzanegger

This isn't an outlandish choice. He ran two successful campaigns as a liberal-ish Republican in a blue state. He governed one of the largest economies in the world. He might be an even bigger celebrity than Trump and he has a devoted following of fans that will bring in votes. Having Schwarzanegger on the ticket might help rational conservatives reconcile the reasonableness of an otherwise unreasonable vote for Trump.

Arnold cannot be president because he was born in Austria so if Trump is out then Paul Ryan would be the Prez. This might seem to cut against Arnold (Geoff would try to snuff Trump in an instant in this scenario), but when you think more it makes total sense. If someone were going to try to assassinate the president, wouldn't you want The Terminator there to protect him? They made like three or four movies on this exact topic where he successfully repelled time-traveling liquid metal monsters to save Edward Furlong! He's perfectly fit to shield The Donald. Sure, some of the more ignorant racist voters would look at the last five letters of Schwarzanegger's name and refuse to vote for him, but how many ignorant racists who are unfamiliar with the Governator can there be?

4. Jim Dolan/Fred Wilpon/Dan Snyder/Donald Sterling

A repugnant inexperienced billionaire president could protect his job by backing himself up with an even more repugnant and inexperienced billionaire vice president. Dolan, Wilpon, Snyder and Sterling have solid track records of atrocious spending and terrible management/decision-making. No one wants them in charge of something as irrelevant as a sports franchise let alone the country. But any one of these four mopes would bring in a lot of votes, perhaps counter-intuitively. If you're a fan of any of their franchises, would you rather have them screwing up your team or screwing up the Trump administration (which will be screwed up no matter the veep selection)? These guys have legs. Snyder and Sterling might be Trump's first options given their enlightened views on race.

5. Stacey Dash

How many famously conservative black women are there? She would provide a modicum of cover on Trump's racist and sexist shortcomings, and she's remarkably photogenic. Damon Dash could be Secretary of Commerce.

6. Dan Quayle

It worked for G.H.W. Bush in 1988.

Any of the foregoing make more sense than a Vice President Christie in terms of getting more votes and for protecting Trump's back. I predict instead that Trump puts Christie up for Justice Scalia's seat and after confirmation he morphs into a law-and-order version of Justice Souter.

And none of it will matter when former Trump endorsee/billionaire Mitt Romney runs as a self-funded independent candidate.

Gheorghe Explains the Election: Presidents' Day Edition

I don't follow sports much these days. I feel like I've seen the same story (or what is now called a "narrative") over and over. The huge rivalry, the huge underdog, the young lion reaching for some record, the old lion looking for one more title, the struggle for historical greatness, the pall of historical collapse. It just doesn't interest me much anymore. And the outcome of any event, no matter how "big," has no real impact on my life. Which is why I now watch politics as a form of sport.

So, on Saturday, instead of watching a bunch of young men half my age dunk basketballs in allegedly novel but actually derivative ways, I watched a bunch of middle-aged guys roughly 10% to 50% older than me debate political issues in actually novel but allegedly conservative (and thus allegedly derivative) ways. I concluded that politics and sports are essentially the same in that general truisms generally do not hold true.

For example, the NFL is allegedly an offensively driven game but teams with top defenses continue to play in and/or win the Super Bowl. Similarly, conventional wisdom says that small-market baseball teams can't do well, despite the fact that four of the last five World Series featured Kansas City or St. Louis (and mid-market Detroit was in the fifth). If we go back 10 years, small-market teams made the Series seven times (St. Louis thrice, KC twice, and Colorado and Tampa once each). So the things that sports pundits say often don't translate to on-field results. Simply put, things don't have to make sense in sports. That's why they play the games--to see who'll win.



Along the same lines, politics doesn't have to make sense. That's why they hold elections--to see who'll win.

For example, Mitt Romney was lambasted in the 2012 primaries (i.e., just four years ago) because he made a metric shitton of money at Bain Captial. Remember this photo?

Romney's success was viewed as a negative--he allegedly was such a ruthless businessman that he shouldn't be president. And remember when his wealth was crass?

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By contrast, Trump voters choose him because he has a reputation for sharp business practices. A seemingly reasonable NH voter was shown on TV saying "You can't deny that Donald Trump is a successful businessman" as justification for his primary vote. Trump flaunts his four corporate bankruptcies as evidence of his business acumen, despite the fact that his creditors (i.e., people to whom he owed money such as vendors and employees) doubtlessly got screwed out of what he owed them. Remarkably, on Saturday Trump said he would close various loopholes of fraud and abuse in the welfare system. I guess it's ok for Trump to use a system to his advantage but others should not.

And according to my bankruptcy expert (zwoman), Trump abused the bankruptcy system by buying under-performing companies and immediately throwing them into chapter 11, thereby sticking his creditors and employees with the bulk of the companies' debts. Trump then got to reorganize the companies and have a fresh start.

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Inconsistencies further abound with Trump. Two debates ago he said that Bill Clinton's infidelity was "fair game" against Hillary. Apparently she enabled Bill to take all those third-party beejays. Of course, Trump cheated on his first wife with Marla Maples, with whom he had a child out of wedlock but eventually married and then divorced, but not before mercilessly hitting on Princess Diana (with no luck). Trump, like Bill Clinton, is 69 years old. Trump's current wife is 45. Monica Lewinsky is 42. Make of that what you will.

Even weirder stuff happened on Saturday. While arguing about who has a more ruthless stance on deporting illegal Latin American immigrants, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, both sons of Latin American immigrants who at one time may or may not have had ruthless stances on deportation, devolved into a separate argument over their respective Spanish language skills. At one point Cruz actually started yelling at Rubio in Spanish. I don't know what he said, but I doubt that performance helped him much with voters who want to deport Spanish speakers (i.e., much of Cruz's base). I suspect we'll see that replayed in some slimy attack ad in the near future.

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Also weird: the debate started with every candidate stating that President Obama should not nominate someone to the Supreme Court after Justice Scalia's death and thus advocating for some abridgment of the President's power despite the fact that (1) they are all running for President and (2) Article II, Section 2 of the United States Constitution says that the President "shall nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint ... judges of the Supreme Court ...." This was remarkably remarkable given that the candidates all praised Justice Scalia's originalism, textualism and conservatism. Jeb! even went so far as to say "Look, I'm an Article II guy but ..." thus acknowledging that this whole line of demagoguery runs counter to the text of the Constitution.

Yet also weird: previous presidential candidates like Howard Dean (the scream) and Joe Biden (multitudes) were deemed too unhinged and, well, unpresidential to be president. But on Saturday most of the candidates tried to put on the worst possible display of deportment they could manage. Even patrician Jeb! started getting gully. Kasich remained above the fray but he's still a goober.

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Still weird: Trump committed apostasy by shredding a former President of his alleged party. I've never seen that before on either side. Sure, he was trying to use the transitive property to shit on Jeb! by shitting on W, but even mere transitive shits on party Presidents are verboten. This act of GOP treason allowed Jeb! to mount his high horse and ride it around the stage while highlighting his royal family in counterpoise to Trump's crassness. This further led to an alley-oop to Rubio, who managed to praise W without praising Jeb! while still shitting on Hillary, all in one sentence. It was great theater. Trump also called for W to be impeached despite the fact that W is no longer President and thus ineligible for impeachment. Later still, Jeb! admitted that W shouldn't have used eminent domain to build a stadium for the Texas Rangers. All in all a bad night for W.

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Continued shitting weirdness: Trump also shat at Lindsey Graham, probably because Graham endorsed Jeb!. This makes less than zero sense in front of a South Carolina crowd, and they booed him. As usual he said that these booers were all Jeb!'s donors. Which makes sense, right? If you back Jeb! and someone attacks him, you boo the attacker. In Trump's (and Trump voters') bizarre view of the world, these Jeb! and Graham fans are "special interests" while Trump's crew is not. But why aren't they? Their interests appear to be separate and apart from other voters', so why aren't they "special"? I'll never get this.

Beyond weird: Obama was dismissed by the GOP in 2008 as too inexperienced to be President. He was "just a community organizer" with only three years of experience in the Senate and almost eight years in the Illinois State Senate, and that supposedly wasn't enough experience to be Commander-in-Chief. This GOP election cycle features two candidates who have never held elected office, 44-year old and 45-year-old Senators with five and three years of Senate experience respectively, a former two-term governor who hasn't held any office in nine years, and John Kasich. Three of the six do not hold an advanced degree. Only Rubio and Cruz have a J.D. Confusingly, the more novice candidates are touting their lack of political experience as an asset, and Republican voters are picking up what they're putting down. I have no explanation.

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I convinced zwoman to watch the debate with me--it was an excuse to drink some of the awesome beer TR gave me and make snarky comments so she relented. She's one of the smartest people I know, an exceptional lawyer, a fun drunk, and a lover of booze and pointed wit. She hasn't followed the Republican race at all because no matter its outcome she'll vote for the Democrat. I had to explain who some of the candidates were and she still can't wrap her head around how Ben Carson got in the running, let alone got any votes, and this lead to a discussion about how the ability to separate conjoined twins can possibly translate to leading the free world.

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After the debate ended she looked at me and said "That was a lot more fun that I thought it would be" which is also what she said after our first romantic interlude many years ago. She then added "I can't believe one of those buffoons is going to get a shot at being president!" I replied "Yes. The only people on that stage who weren't lying were Bush, Carson, and maybe Kasich. Carson is a dope and Kasich is a dork." To which she said "That's my impression too. I can't believe I'm going to say this, but I really hope Jeb[!] wins the nomination. Wait ... so we'll have another Clinton-Bush election?!? That's the best outcome?!? What just happened?!?!?"

Somewhere Mitt Romney is drinking a glass of warm milk and wondering where he screwed up. Election 2016 y'all!

Goodlatte, b.A.A.d. logic

On October 30 I sent the following email to rob:

Have you been following this? Insane.

http://legaltimes.typepad.com/blt/2013/10/democrats-republicans-spar-over-dc-circuit.html

http://www.courthousenews.com/2013/10/30/62473.htm

I might turn this into a post.

He said nothing so I thought it un-postworthy. Recent comments (namely rob's directive to "write that shit z") spurred me to action.

As you can see in the links I emailed rob almost a month ago, Rep. Bob Goodlatte of Virginia accused President Obama of "court packing" the Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit, alleging that the President's "three nominations, with the confirmation of another, is intended to pack the D.C. Circuit to capacity of 11 authorized judgeships." As George Will would say ... Well.

The term "court packing" came about when aspects of FDR's New Deal legislation were struck down by the Supreme Court in several 5-4 votes. Article III of the Constitution requires a Supreme Court but it doesn't say how many Justices must sit on its bench. Originally there were 6 and currently there are 9 (nice), but at one point there were 10 and at another time there were 8; for a while there were only 5. FDR decided that he would push his New Deal programs through the Supreme Court by increasing the number of Justices from 9 to 15, the logic being that his 6 appointees would vote for his programs and thus he would always win handily by 10-5 margins. Before this happened, Justice Roberts started voting in FDR's favor and there was no need to pack the court. This is famously referred to as "the switch in time that saved nine."

More succinctly, court packing happens when the President adds more judges to a court than the court currently holds. As Rep. Goodlatte acknowledged, the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit has 11 judgeships. Right now there are only 8 judges in the D.C. Circuit, thus simple arithmetic shows that 3 of the positions on this bench are currently vacant. By filling those 3 vacancies, President Obama will bring the D.C. Circuit to 11 judges. 8 + 3 = 11. Further, 11 = 11. It cannot be said that 11 > 11 or that 11 < 11. Thus, when President Obama fills the 3 vacancies on the D.C. Circuit, he is returning it to its full capacity. In fact, when he took office the D.C. Circuit had seats for 12 judges, and it was reduced to 11 in 2009! If anything, Obama has reduced the size of the D.C. Circuit! So President Obama clearly is not engaging in "court packing" by putting up 3 names for 3 empty seats on the D.C. Circuit.

I understand this and I'm an idiot. I also disdain history; it was my least favorite subject in school and I haven't taken a history class since 12th grade. Nonetheless, I know that know what court packing is, and I know that 11 = 11, thus I know that there is no court packing afoot with respect to the D.C. Circuit.

Bob Goodlatte knows this too. He's a smart man with a degree in political science from Bates and a J.D. from Washington & Lee, and 20 years of service in Congress. He knows what court packing is (again, he has a degree in poli sci from Bates), and he knows how to add 3 and 8. So he knows that there is no court packing going on here.

Do you know what I call it when someone says something that they know isn't true? Lying. Bob Goodlatte is fucking lying when he says that President Obama is trying to pack the D.C. Circuit. And that's shameful.



If I were a weasely Federalist Society lawyer I would say something like "Rep. Goodlatte said 'pack ... to capacity,' he did not explicitly accuse the President of 'court packing.' These are two completely different things." And whoever says that is fucking lying too. It's crystal clear that Rep. Goodlatte is trying to make this into something it isn't. Everyone who graduated from high school knows that the term "court packing" has a pejorative connotation and is associated with Presidential over-reaching. Rep. Goodlatte is falsely trying to make it appear that President Obama is over-reaching by using a phrase that jogs everyone's memory as being negative, even though they don't remember why.



Assuming that Rep. Goodlatte isn't lying, and that he simply wasn't paying attention at Bates or W&L, his logic is still deeply flawed. President G.W. Bush had two open seats on the Supreme Court and he nominated C.J. Roberts and J. Alito because he knew their political ideologies are similar to his and that they would vote in a way that made him happy. Did President Bush "pack the [Supreme Court] to capacity of [9] authorized judgeships"? Of course not. Bush didn't pack SCOTUS, he merely returned it to a fully armed and operational court.

Or to make an equally stupid analogy, under Rep. Goodlatte's logic the people of the state of New Jersey "pack[ed] the [Senate] to capacity of [100] authorized [senators]" when they held a special election to fill Frank Lautenberg's seat. Here's another proposition that's just as stupid: Gov. Chris Christie "pack[ed] the [Senate] to capacity of [100] authorized [senators]" when he appointed Jeffrey Chiesa as interim senator when Lautenberg died. The Senate doesn't do anything these days except shut the government down so surely they can get by with 99 senators.

Which segues nicely to my next rant. It has been argued that the D.C. Circuit doesn't need more judges because they don't hear as many cases as other appellate courts. For example, the Wall Street Journal notes that the D.C. Circuit handles "only" 149 appeals per judge, and if it had all 11 judges on board they would "only" handle 108 appeals per judge. This is a bullshit argument. The Supreme Court hears 75-80 cases a year, so by WSJ's logic we could get by with just one Justice. Further, Congress controls the number of judges in any Circuit Court under 28 USC 44, so if you think there are too many judges in the D.C. Circuit then get Congress to shrink it!

Perhaps most egregiously, these nattering Republicans ignore the fact that the D.C. Circuit has 6 Senior Judges, 5 of whom were appointed by Presidents Reagan or G.H.W. Bush. After judges take Senior status they still hear cases, albeit at a reduced workload of anywhere from 25% to 75%, depending on how much any individual judge wants to work. So even if President Obama's nominees are confirmed, 9 of the 17 judges on the D.C. Circuit will be Republican appointees. Given that an appellate panel has 3 judges, there will be 1,080 possible panels of D.C. Circuit judges that have 2 or more Republican appointees (9 x 8 x 15 = 1080). By contrast, there will be 840 possible panels that have 2 or more Democrat appointees (8 x 7 x 15 = 840).

So stop lying and whining, you Republican ninnies. And this is all the Democrats' fault in the first place.

The person who wins the presidential election gets various powers to do all sorts of important stuff, including the appointment power. Some of that is highly visible, like picking federal judges. Other aspects are not that well publicized, like appointing the Librarian of Congress or the Deputy Director of the USPTO. Regardless of how much press these nominations get they are all important, and they are one of many reasons why presidential elections are important. It seems like every four years some boob at the Washington Post writes an editorial about how this election is the most important election ever because Justices X, Y, and Z are old and will soon die or retire, and the winner of the election will therefore shape the Supreme Court for years to come. Informed voters know this and vote accordingly. All Presidential nominees deserve an up or down vote regardless of which party holds what office, and in my view they should be confirmed unless they are blatantly unqualified for the job or if they have some blemish on their record that calls their character and fitness into question. You know I'm right when Charles Krauthammer agrees with me -- "Elections have consequences"!

Sorry Rep. Goodlatte, your candidate lost. I understand that you're unhappy, but don't lie to get what you want. It's unseemly. Just keep calm and if your candidate wins in 2016 you can unpack all the courts you want.

I'm too late with this but ...

You know we are grasping for filler when we're running this extremely belated zman filler...Gheorghe-mas Day Nine is in the works, all I need is for people to actually reply to me with Day Nine content. Hell, Marls, danimal, Shlara, Squeaks...if you have any "tubes of you" you'd like to send my way for posting consideration, feel free to do so.

Who's afraid of Virginia Foxx? Her constituents, hopefully.

Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) is not very Gheorghe. According to Rep. Foxx:

"Everywhere I go in my district, people tell me they are frightened. … I share that fear, and I believe they should be fearful. And I believe the greatest fear that we all should have to our freedom comes from this room — this very room — and what may happen later this week in terms of a tax increase bill masquerading as a health care bill. I believe we have more to fear from the potential of that bill passing than we do from any terrorist right now in any country."





Let's file this one under "batshit craziness."

Insert Maudlin Overdramatic 'Dawn of a New Era' Sentiment Here

I won't waste your time with a lot of unoriginal thoughts on today's inauguration, except to say that I'm more than a little overwhelmed by the buzz. From that perspective, the bar has been set incredibly high for President Obama. Fortunately for him, the competence bar is pegged at subterranean levels after the last 8 years.

But I come here not to bury President Bush, but to praise G:TB's own Teejay (pictured below), who is putting aside his partisan views and celebrating President Obama's inauguration with the good people of the State Society of Arizona. We expect a full report tomorrow.