Voters Want Trump/GOP To Focus On Domestic Problems

 

The charts above are from the Navigator Poll -- done between February 19th and 22nd of a nationwide sample of 1,000 registered voters, with a 3.1 point margin of error.

Texans And Americans Oppose The GOP Redistricting Of Texas

The chart above reflects the results of the Z To A Research Poll -- done between August 3rd and 5th of 1,921 likely midterm voters in Texas. The poll has a 2.24 point margin of error.

The chart above is from the YouGov Poll -- done between August 8th and 11th of a nationwide sample of 1,122 adults, with a 4 point margin of error.

Most People Oppose The GOP's "Big Beautiful Bill"

 

The charts above are from the Kaiser Family Foundation Poll -- done between June 4th and 8th of a nationwide sample of 1,321 adults, with a 3 point margin of error.

Louisiana GOP Tries To Force Religion On School Children

Dan Rather comments on the Louisiana GOP's mandate to put the Ten Commandments in every school classroom:

Just when you think the audacity meter has reached its zenith, along comes the Republican-dominated Louisiana state legislature. This week it passed — and the state’s far-right governor signed — a law requiring all public classrooms to display the Ten Commandments. 

 

Governor Jeff Landry argued that the Commandments are not simply religious treatise but “foundational documents of our state and national government,” perhaps trying to circumvent the inevitable hue and cry from just about everyone.

I’ll get to the hue and cry in a moment. First, if one wants to talk about foundational documents of our government, I think the Constitution is a better place to start. The First Amendment guarantees the separation of church and state. Full stop. Requiring the displaying of the Ten Commandments violates the constitutional principle of religious neutrality. 

Honoring Supreme Court precedent is another foundational tenet of our democracy. Yes, this has happened before. In 1980’s Stone v. Graham, the Supreme Court struck down a Kentucky law that also required the display of the Ten Commandments in schools. The court found that the law violated the First Amendment’s establishment clause. In its opinion, the court wrote that the Ten Commandments are “undeniably a sacred text in the Jewish and Christian faiths” and displaying them “serves no ... educational function.”

One could argue that Louisiana should be more concerned with the quality of the education in those classrooms than what is on their walls. The state ranks near the bottom nationally for education and 50th for overall quality of life. Perhaps instead of this political stunt, Louisiana lawmakers should think about raising teacher pay, among the lowest in the nation. Or maybe try to keep kids in school? The state ranks 48th in graduation rate. 

Putting an 11-by-14-inch poster “in a large easy to read font” in every classroom from kindergarten through graduate school will cost money. Don’t worry — it will be paid for by private donations. But who will pay for the inevitable and orchestrated legal fight to come? Louisiana taxpayers. 

After eight years of a Democratic governor, the Republican- controlled state legislature is making up for what it sees as lost time. It recently turned down federal aid for summer food assistance, claiming it wants Louisiana families to be self-sufficient. Those same families suffer from a higher rate of food insecurity than most of the country. And Louisiana is the first state to advance a measure designating abortion pills as dangerous controlled substances. 

 

Now to the hue and cry. It was loud and it was immediate, coming from, among others, the American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and the Southern Poverty Law Center, which jointly stated that the law “violates students’ and families’ fundamental right to religious freedom.”

So why would Louisiana bother with what seems to be a cut-and-dried case of unconstitutionality?  

“I can’t wait to be sued,” Governor Landry said at a Republican fundraiser in Nashville, according to The Tennessean. Good thing, because the ACLU has already filed suit.

All this is part of a larger national plan by a minority of  Christians to inject expressions of their faith into everyday life, whether we like it or not. With a highly politicized and far-right majority on the Supreme Court at the ready, these groups believe they will get a friendlier reception from the court and could ultimately be successful. 

 

They have reason to be hopeful. In 2022, the court sided with a high school football coach who argued he had the right to pray on the 50-yard line after games. The increasingly porous boundary between church and state seems to be eroding faster than a snowball in July. Even so, legal experts think this one is a real stretch.

Charles C. Haynes, an expert in religious liberty and civil discourse, told The New York Times that he believes the state is “overreaching,” adding that “even this court will have a hard time justifying” what Louisiana lawmakers came up with. 

But perhaps most interesting is how do parents and lawmakers square the behavior of their revered MAGA leader with the Ten Commandments? 

 

Democratic strategist David Axelrod on X had this recommendation: “Here’s a suggested quiz for the schoolchildren of Louisiana: ‘Look at the poster on the wall of the Ten Commandments and write down the total number Donald Trump has broken.’”

We could quibble about the total number, but let no one be mistaken: This new Louisiana law is a dangerous development for our country. Donald Trump champions a national movement to eliminate the separation between church and state.   

Louisiana GOP Violates The Constitution With New Mandate

 From Dan Rather:

Just when you think the audacity meter has reached its zenith, along comes the Republican-dominated Louisiana state legislature. This week it passed — and the state’s far-right governor signed — a law requiring all public classrooms to display the Ten Commandments. 

 

Governor Jeff Landry argued that the Commandments are not simply religious treatise but “foundational documents of our state and national government,” perhaps trying to circumvent the inevitable hue and cry from just about everyone.

I’ll get to the hue and cry in a moment. First, if one wants to talk about foundational documents of our government, I think the Constitution is a better place to start. The First Amendment guarantees the separation of church and state. Full stop. Requiring the displaying of the Ten Commandments violates the constitutional principle of religious neutrality. 

Honoring Supreme Court precedent is another foundational tenet of our democracy. Yes, this has happened before. In 1980’s Stone v. Graham, the Supreme Court struck down a Kentucky law that also required the display of the Ten Commandments in schools. The court found that the law violated the First Amendment’s establishment clause. In its opinion, the court wrote that the Ten Commandments are “undeniably a sacred text in the Jewish and Christian faiths” and displaying them “serves no ... educational function.”

One could argue that Louisiana should be more concerned with the quality of the education in those classrooms than what is on their walls. The state ranks near the bottom nationally for education and 50th for overall quality of life. Perhaps instead of this political stunt, Louisiana lawmakers should think about raising teacher pay, among the lowest in the nation. Or maybe try to keep kids in school? The state ranks 48th in graduation rate.

 

Putting an 11-by-14-inch poster “in a large easy to read font” in every classroom from kindergarten through graduate school will cost money. Don’t worry — it will be paid for by private donations. But who will pay for the inevitable and orchestrated legal fight to come? Louisiana taxpayers. 

After eight years of a Democratic governor, the Republican- controlled state legislature is making up for what it sees as lost time. It recently turned down federal aid for summer food assistance, claiming it wants Louisiana families to be self-sufficient. Those same families suffer from a higher rate of food insecurity than most of the country. And Louisiana is the first state to advance a measure designating abortion pills as dangerous controlled substances.

  

Now to the hue and cry. It was loud and it was immediate, coming from, among others, the American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and the Southern Poverty Law Center, which jointly stated that the law “violates students’ and families’ fundamental right to religious freedom.”

So why would Louisiana bother with what seems to be a cut-and-dried case of unconstitutionality?  

“I can’t wait to be sued,” Governor Landry said at a Republican fundraiser in Nashville, according to The Tennessean. Good thing, because the ACLU has already filed suit.

All this is part of a larger national plan by a minority of  Christians to inject expressions of their faith into everyday life, whether we like it or not. With a highly politicized and far-right majority on the Supreme Court at the ready, these groups believe they will get a friendlier reception from the court and could ultimately be successful.  

They have reason to be hopeful. In 2022, the court sided with a high school football coach who argued he had the right to pray on the 50-yard line after games. The increasingly porous boundary between church and state seems to be eroding faster than a snowball in July. Even so, legal experts think this one is a real stretch.

Charles C. Haynes, an expert in religious liberty and civil discourse, told The New York Times that he believes the state is “overreaching,” adding that “even this court will have a hard time justifying” what Louisiana lawmakers came up with. 

But perhaps most interesting is how do parents and lawmakers square the behavior of their revered MAGA leader with the Ten Commandments? 

 

Democratic strategist David Axelrod on X had this recommendation: “Here’s a suggested quiz for the schoolchildren of Louisiana: ‘Look at the poster on the wall of the Ten Commandments and write down the total number Donald Trump has broken.’”

We could quibble about the total number, but let no one be mistaken: This new Louisiana law is a dangerous development for our country. Donald Trump champions a national movement to eliminate the separation between church and state.  

Texas GOP Platform Is MAGA's National Wish List

The Texas Republican Party just passed a terrifying platform. But don't think the nutty ideas contained in it are just for Texas. Crazy Texas GOP ideas have a way of becoming national GOP ideas. Andrea Grimes (at MSNBC.com) explains:

I covered my first Texas Republican Party Convention in 2010, during the Tea Party movement’s ascendance at the state and the national levels. My editors warned me ahead of time that I would see and hear some wild stuff, but cautioned me against taking any of it too seriously in my reporting. This was “red meat” for the base, not serious policy. I got the memo: my coverage, for the Dallas Observer alt-weekly, was full of snark and derision.

But 14 years later, many of the priorities for which I mocked the Texas GOP’s faithfulest-of-the-faithful have indeed been realized, both here in Texas and nationally. Now, their latest platform, which delegates voted on last weekend, endorses the conspiracist “great reset” theory, declares that “abortion is not health care, it is homicide,” and calls for a new election law requiring candidates running for statewide offices to win a majority of Texas’ 254 counties, effectively barring any Democrat from the position. And that’s just the start. . . .

 I would hope that, by now, we political writers have realized that the “fringes” of the Republican Party — in Texas or anywhere else — are the primary drivers of politics, policy and personnel. I would hope that we finally take seriously the idea that the Texas GOP platform is a statement of intent. 

As the Dallas Morning News’s Gromer Jeffers wrote after the party’s 2022 convention, “many proposals once thought too extreme are becoming public policy.” Of course they are; between the Tea Party and Trump, the farthest-right factions of the Texas GOP have amassed a tremendous amount of power and influence. From Gov. Abbott to Lt. Gov Dan Patrick and Attorney General Ken Paxton on down, Texas Republicans now take their orders from the blathering, criminal bigot from New York City. 

American conservatism, bent as it always has been toward authoritarian rule, white supremacy and xenophobia, has long been ripe for this kind of takeover. For decades, even supposedly more moderate and mainstream Republican politics have been dominated by public pledges to do, well, exactly what Republicans are now doing: outlawing abortion, censoring free speech and terrorizing immigrants, queer people and religious believers (even Christians!) who fail to comply with the GOP’s vision for America as an evangelical Christian theocracy.    

There are many, many horrors to behold in the latest platform, and they must be taken seriously not in spite of how terrifying the document is, but because of how terrifying the document is. It is because the latest Texas GOP platform endorses “prohibiting the teaching of sex education, sexual health, or sexual choice or identity” that we should take it seriously. It is because the platform equates abortion and murder that we should take it seriously. It is because the platform aims to ban any Democrat — and indeed, any noncompliant Republican — from ever holding statewide office, that we should take it seriously.

This stuff cannot and should not be written off as outsider, fringe crankery. Because it isn’t. And the rightward, increasingly fascist swing in the GOP in Texas and nationally is far from complete. We have seen it amplified year over year in Texas, and with Trump’s takeover of the RNC, we are going to see much more of this across the country. We dismiss that fundamental truth at our peril.

More Say Trump Hurt GOP In Midterms Than Helped Them

The chart above reflects the results of the Yahoo News / YouGov Poll -- done between December 1st and 5th of a nationwide sample of 1,635 adults, with about a 3 point margin of error.

PRRI Survey Shows GOP Out-Of-Step With Most Adults

Here are four interesting charts from the Public Religion Research Institute. They questioned 2,527 adults between August 22nd and September 15th of this year. The margin of error for the survey is 2.8 points.

Trump is holding his Republican base, but he's not doing well with anyone else.

How The GOP Tax Reform Hurts You And Your Family

From Democrats.org.

GOP Tax Plan - A Trojan Horse For Wealth Redistribution

The op-ed below (and the image above) are from the blog of former Labor Secretary Robert Reich (pictured). He exposes the GOP tax plan for what it is -- an effort to redistribute more wealth from the middle and working classes to the rich. He writes:

The goal of Trump and the Republican leaders is to pull off a giant redistribution of over $1 trillion from the middle-class, working-class, and poor to the rich, who are already richer than ever.

They’re selling this to the public with a false claim that the middle-class will benefit from their tax cut plan. It’s a gigantic Trojan horse. 

For most Americans, the proposed tax cuts are tiny and temporary. That’s right – temporary.  They will shrink in just a few years.  And some middle class Americans will actually get a tax increase.

Meanwhile, the top 1 percent will get a gigantic tax cut. The Tax Policy Center estimates that the current plan will save the bottom 80 percent between $50 and $450 in taxes per year, but that it saves each person in the top 1 percent an average of $129,000 a year. For people at the very top, like Trump himself, the tax cuts are humongous. And the corporations they own will also get a massive tax cut.

Republicans say economic “growth” will pay for the tax cuts, so there’s no need to cut social programs like Medicare and Medicaid.   

But Republicans have just passed a budget that would cut nearly $1.5 trillion from Medicare and Medicaid to pay for these tax cuts.  Pell Grants, housing assistance, and even cancer research are also on the chopping block.

Now, they say we shouldn’t take their budget resolution seriously. It was just a device to get the tax bill through the Senate with 51 votes. 

But once these tax cuts are passed, the budget deficit will explode. The Tax Policy Center predicts that it will cut federal revenue by $2.4 trillion over the next 10 years.

When that happens, the only way out of the crisis will be something dramatic  –  exactly the cuts in Medicare and Medicaid, and maybe even Social Security – that Republicans have wanted for years. 

By this time, any talk of raising taxes on the rich will be dismissed.

Using the promise of middle-class tax cuts as a Trojan horse for a tax windfall for the rich and deep spending cuts is a tactic dating back to the Reagan administration. 

But the version they’re aiming for now is “YUGE.”

We must see the strategy for what it is.  And it must be stopped.

Not Racist ?

And don't even try to say it's because of his "socialist" policies? President Obama is one of the most moderate and centrist Democrats ever elected, and far to the right of Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy, and Johnson -- and probably Carter and Clinton too. The GOP only wants Voter ID because they lost twice to an African-American, and now stand a very good chance of losing to a woman. The "good old days" of white male privilege are crumbling, and they just can't stand it.

A County GOP In Virginia Steps Way Over The Line

The images seen above were included as part of a "Halloween" memo sent out by the Loudoun County (Virginia) GOP. I have no problem with most of the images -- after all, Halloween is a fun holiday and people should have fun with it (and zombifying your political opponents, like was done with the picture of Rep. Pelosi, can be a good-natured part of that fun).

But I have a big problem with the middle picture on the top row -- the picture of the President of the United States with a bullet hole in his forehead and his brains exposed. That is inappropriate, to say the least. For an older guy like me, it instantly brought back memories of another president shot in the head exposing his brains -- President John F. Kennedy. And my second thought was whether this could give the "crazies" in our society the idea that doing the same thing to President Obama would somehow be acceptable.

Frankly we have enough problems with virulent racism in this country without publishing such an image. In a country where we have seen the assassinations of John Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, and the attempted assassinations of Ronald Reagan and Gabrielle Giffords-- not to mention past presidents and leaders who have been killed -- is way over the line of decency, common sense, and acceptable behavior.

I don't know if it was racism or just incredible stupidity. In either case, it is just not something that should be tolerated. The Republicans are now doing some "damage control". Pat Mullins, chairman of the Virginia Republican Party, said, "The disgusting image used today on a mass e-mail has no place in our politics. Ever. The Republican Party of Virginia condemns the image and its use in the strongest possible terms."

I appreciate those words by Mr. Mullins. But I have to wonder what kind of person, a county party official, could have thought that the image would be appropriate, even funny. The e-mail should never have been sent, or even considered for distribution, and the official who OK'd it should be fired.

Early State Polls Show Romney In Lead

Mitt Romney still seems to be the favorite choice of the political pundits. Recently even Democratic pundit James Carville, usually a pretty astute person politically, came out and said he believed Mitt Romney would be the Republican presidential candidate. Carville told George Stephanopoulos that Romney will win because Perry and Cain aren't serious candidates, and said:

 "I don't think so. I mean Rick Perry's completely blown himself up. There's zero chance that Herman Cain's going to be the nominee. The only thing that I can see is that Republicans just don't like him enough that he can't accumulate half the delegates as he goes through this. That these candidates just keep going and becoming such an irritant that he can't close the deal but that's almost impossible to imagine."

But I'm not ready to crown Romney the winner yet. He may have the lead, but he has yet to show that he can get any teabagger votes -- something he will have to do to get the nomination. And the race is still very fluid. This is shown by a new CNN/Time Poll done by ORC between October 20th and 25th. The poll questioned Republicans in the four earliest caucus/primary states -- 401 in Florida, 405 in Iowa, 400 in New Hampshire, and 400 in South Carolina. Here's how it stands in those states right now:

Border Wall Is Still A Stupid Idea

In an obvious effort to appeal to the anti-immigrant and racist wing of the Republican base, several of the GOP presidential candidates have revived talk of building a wall between the friendly nations of Mexico and the United States. This is especially dumb considering the fact that President Obama's administration has deported more undocumented immigrants than the Bush administration did, and the number of immigrants trying to enter the United States has fallen drastically due to the deplorable American economy.

I have discussed in the past about how the border fence is an unworkable solution to immigration problems, that is an insult to our Mexican neighbors and an environmental and economic disaster for both sides of the border. It now turns out that the fence can cause or exacerbate flooding problems in the border area -- flooding problems that are totally unnecessary. before any more building is done, those wanting the silly fence should read this article by Scott Nicol in the Rio Grande Guardian. Nicol says:

GOP Race Is Still Anybody's To Win

We're only about 9 weeks away from the Iowa caucuses, the start of the primary season, and there is still no real clue as to who the Republican presidential nominee is going to be. No one candidate has come forward to stake a real claim to being the odds-on favorite. Michelle Bachmann won the Iowa straw poll, Herman Cain did the same in Florida, and Ron Paul finished first in the California straw poll. Meanwhile, Romney, Cain, and Perry have all had their turn in leading the national polls, but none of them has been able to get above the twenties in national poll support.

A new New York Times/CBS News Poll shows just how unsettled the race still is. The poll was conducted between October 19th and 24th of 455 Republican primary voters, and once again no candidate was able to get more than 25% voter support. Here is how the poll showed the candidates standing right now:

Perry Becomes A Birther

Rick Perry dropped by to visit Donald Trump the other day, probably to beg for money and hope Trump would put in a good word for him with the teabaggers (who seemed to like Trump while he was playing with the idea of entering the race). Then Perry gave an interview to Parade Magazine, in which he said he didn't know whether President Obama was born in the United States or not. Here are his actual words:

Governor, do you believe that President Barack Obama was born in the United States?I have no reason to think otherwise. 

That’s not a definitive, “Yes, I believe he”— 
Well, I don’t have a definitive answer, because he’s never seen my birth certificate. 

But you’ve seen his.I don’t know. Have I? 

You don’t believe what’s been released?I don’t know. I had dinner with Donald Trump the other night. 

And?That came up. 

And he said?He doesn’t think it’s real. 

And you said?I don’t have any idea. It doesn’t matter. He’s the President of the United States. He’s elected. It’s a distractive issue. 

Now all the media wants to talk about is Perry becoming a "birther". I don't believe it. Perry's not very bright, but he's not Tait/Trump stupid. He's just trolling for votes among the intellectually-challenged.

You have to understand what a disaster his presidential bid has been. He started out with a lead over everyone else, including Romney. But after the public found out about his views on Social Security and Medicare, and then watched his flailing around in the Republican debates, they started to have serious doubts about him. Since then, he fallen like a rock in the polls.

Perry knows he's not going to get establishment Republicans to vote for him -- Romney has that vote sowed up. But its not the establishment Republicans who will be picking the candidate this year -- its the teabaggers, the idiot wing of the party. Right now the flavor of the month for the teabaggers is Herman Cain, but no one really expects him to get the nomination. And if he doesn't, who will the teabaggers back? Currently that vote is being split by Cain, Perry, Bachmann, Gingrich, Santorum, and Paul, but in the next few months they'll have to settle on someone.

Perry's "birther" statement was just the opening volley in the war for the teabagger vote. He knows they won't vote for mainstream ideas or candidates, so he's going back out to the lunatic fringe (where he's pretty comfortable anyway). He tried to mitigate the idea by calling it a distraction (just in case he makes it to the general election), but there is no doubt he was aiming his remarks at the teabaggers. Will it work? Maybe, he does have $17 million to try and rehabilitate his candidacy. We'll just have to wait and see.