All posts by Dr. ESP

The First Female President

Media

…and how the news media contribute to that NOT happening.

I have no idea who will be the first female president of the United States or when her election will finally happen.  What I do know is systemic sexism within the ranks of journalists and political pundits, including females, hampers that eventuality.

The most recent example was former Obama communications director Jennifer Palmieri’s appearance on “Morning Joe” during which she discussed her latest article in Vanity Fair, “The Spartan: Why Gretchen Whitmer Has What It Takes for a White House Run.”  Palmieri’s assessment included the Michigan governor’s demonstrated grace under pressure during the pandemic when faced with armed protests at the state capitol and threats to her personal health and safety.  And how local and national pundits underestimated her appeal when she ran for re-election in 2022.

Yet, right on cue, MSNBC regular guest John Heilemann asked Palmieri about voters’ perception of a woman as commander-in-chief.

As you know having been close to Hillary Clinton, the question of ready to be commander-in-chief, a question that she, a former secretary of state grappled with, thought was really important, knew that a woman would have to answer at a higher level of scrutiny than a man would, does any governor, much less a female governor have to answer that question any differently?  Is there any thinking going on in Gretchen Whitmer’s world how to overcome that challenge?

If Governor Whitmer had been at the table, I imagine she would have treated Heilemann to some good old time “womansplaining.”  She would have reminded him that she and every other governor, male or female, is a commander-in-chief with primary responsibility for their respective states’ National Guard.  They have mobilized forces in cases of civil unrest and natural disasters.  And at the president’s request, they send troops overseas to defend the nation’s security and interests.  And they perform the solemn duty of being there when fallen members of the Guard are brought home.

In Whitmer’s absence, no one on the “Morning Joe” set had the hands-on knowledge to make this argument.  Nor was this a one-off occurrence.  Consider the following IMDB tally of guest appearances on the program.

Washington Post writer Eugene Robinson (224 episodes)
John Heilemann (176 episodes)
Foreign relations expert Richard Hass (157 episodes)
Presidential historian John Meacham (151 episodes)
Branding guru Donny Deutsch (139 episodes)
Economist Steve Rattner (133 episodes)
Former Senator Claire McCaskill (80 episodes)
Retired admiral James Stavridis (76 episodes)

The first governor on the list is former Maine chief executive Angus King, although his 21 appearances came after he left the statehouse and was elected to the U.S. Senate.  You eventually reach former Virginia governor Mark Warner (now Senator) and former Vermont governor Howard Dean, each with 10 appearances.  The conversation is never about their years in Augusta, Richmond or Montpelier, respectively.

The first sitting governor is much farther down the listing, Maryland’s Wes Moore with eight bookings during which he can share his less than six months in office. Don’t get me wrong, Moore has a bright political future but his on-the-job training as governor is less than complete.  Eventually you get to New Jersey governor Phil Murphy, in office since 2019, with nine appearances.

Having served in state positions under three governors and as a policy director at the National Governors Association, I recognize my belief that governors make better presidents than legislators is biased and therefore tainted.  But it is not personal.  President of the United States is an executive job.  Success depends on organizational leadership and management skills, not oratory or crafting legislative language.  There is no better training ground than a governor’s office.  Although on a smaller scale, the daily responsibilities of any governor are much the same as a president’s.

Just ask Gretchen Whitmer.  She had to deal with armed protesters invading the Michigan statehouse in May 2020, eight months before the January 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol.  And she activated the state’s National Guard on January 11, 2011 to deter similar confrontations ahead of Joe Biden’s inauguration.  That is what a commander-in-chief does.  And you can learn how to do it better through experience commanding troops, not playing soldier at a military boarding school.

For what it’s worth.
Dr. ESP

Make America Florida

Politics

Based on his runaway re-election campaign in 2022, Florida governor Ron DeSantis thought he had conjured up the secret sauce for doing the same across the country.  This morning we learned that DeSantis’ victory may not be the shield of invincibility he thinks it is.  We also learned the difference between DeSantis and Donald Trump.  The latter claims he WILL BE the retribution.  The former demonstrated, via his budget vetoes, he ALREADY IS.  Consider the following two news reports which came across my news feed this morning.

From Mike Phillips, editor of our local on-line news service The Fernandina Observer:

Wow. Did that governor of ours ever give us something to think about. We thought our request for a million bucks to help us advance our riverfront stabilization project was a no-brainer.

He thought not.

My first thought, of course, was, “How can he do that to us? Doesn’t he know how important tourism is to our economy and Florida’s? And what’s a measly million-dollar contribution to our modest historic district flood management project at a mere $14-18 million overall?” Visitors won’t spend money if their feet are wet. Doesn’t he get that?”

This morning’s edition of Politico.com includes an article titled, “DeSantis’ budget vetoes include projects from GOP lawmakers who didn’t endorse him.”  It quotes State Senator Joe Gruters (R-Sarasota).

The governor is clearly upset I endorsed Donald Trump for president and so he took it out on the people of Sarasota County. Simply because I support his political opponent, the governor chose to punish ordinary Floridians who want better water quality, less traffic congestion and increased for resources for disabled children to grateful employment. It’s mean-spirited acts like this that are defining him here and across the country.

During his recent campaign trip to Iowa, DeSantis echoed other Republicans who claim the Biden administration has weaponized government and is coming after you.  Maybe he felt the average Iowa voter did not understand what he meant by this.  So, he decided to show them, by example. exactly how it works.  He also showed potential presidential primary voters across the national exactly what “Make America Florida” would look like.

POSTSCRIPT: The Wrong Analogy

A January 2, 2023, Morning Consult poll of registered Republican voters had DeSantis trailing Donald Trump by 11 percentage points (34-45).  Despite the deficit, conservative media declared the Florida governor was within striking distance, especially considering the campaign war chest he amassed and did not have to spend during his 2022 bid for re-election and new-found support by large donors who were ready to move past Trump.  Fast forward to June 11, 2023, when the latest Morning Consult poll shows Trump trouncing DeSantis 59-19 percent.  Which many pundits viewed as a replay of former Wisconsin governor Scott Walker’s precipitous fall from grace.  Walker was the odds-on favorite to win the 2016 presidential nomination until he suspended his campaign on September 21, 2015, five months before the Iowa caucus.

Confidence in Walker’s ability to win the nomination was based on his previous success in Wisconsin characterized by his fiery rhetoric and skill as a retail campaigner, two attributes even supporters do not associate with DeSantis.  Why the excitement surrounding DeSantis?  He was the early darling of the donor class, supplementing his 2022 surplus with millions in new money.  This is not the first time a GOP contender was anointed at this phase of a presidential contest based on his fundraising ability.  In 1996, Texas Senator Phil Gramm was thought to have the nomination sewed up when he officially announced his candidacy on February 25, 1995.  On March 31, 1995, the Tampa Bay Times wrote, “Sen. Phil Gramm of Texas dwarfed the competition Thursday as the GOP presidential candidates revealed their fund-raising totals during the first three months of the race”

Contrary to the advertising slogan, “Money talks and nobody walks,” made famous by Cash Cars, a family-owned dealership in Circleville, Ohio, Gramm strolled away from the 1996 presidential race on February 14, 1996.  A look under the hood suggests DeSantis is more like a Gramm, not a Walker.

For what it’s worth.
Dr. ESP

 

Bill Buckley, Won’t You Please Come Home

Media

The late William F. Buckley (1925-2008) was the voice of sane conservativism in America for decades and founder of The National Review.  Do not misunderstand what I mean by “sane.”  As late as the 1960s, Buckley opposed national civil rights legislation and continued to support racial segregation. In an April 2021 article about continued efforts to suppress black voting, Mississippi Free Press reporter Ashton Pittman reminded readers how little had changed since Buckley’s heyday.  In a 1957 National Review editorial. “Why the South Must Prevail,’ he justified the region’s right to impose Jim Crow laws.

Millions who have the vote do not care to exercise it; millions who have it do not know how to exercise it and do not care to learn. The great majority of the Negroes of the South who do not vote do not care to vote, and would not know for what to vote if they could.

This and other misguided and un-democratic positions remain a stain on an exceptional journalistic career.  What he never did was describe those who disagreed as Marxists, communists or “wannabe dictators.”  Nor did he encourage storming the Capitol as Congress debated and passed the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts in the mid-1960s.  In a 2004 Time Magazine interview, Buckley admitted he had been on the wrong side of history.

I once believed we could evolve our way up from Jim Crow. I was wrong. Federal intervention was necessary.

It is one thing to initially harbor wrong views and evolve.  It is another to be dishonest and unlawful.

I thought about Buckley when I saw the headline for an op-ed essay in this month’s issue of Politico Magazine by current National Review editor-in-chief Rich Lowry. In “A Trump Pardon Could Drain Poison from the System,” Lowry argues “sparing him jail time would ease our divided politics.”  Lowry is entitled to his opinion, but the case he makes is factually inaccurate and intellectually corrupt.  

Lowry admits, “…based on the evidence we have now, he appears to be caught dead to rights.”  He then immediately pivots to a major MAGA-world talking point.

At the same time, nothing good is going to come from the political and legal warfare inevitable with the prosecution by the U.S. government of the leader of the opposition party.

Does he deny two things can be true simultaneously?  Yes, he is the titular leader of the GOP, but he is also an alleged felon.  Excusing him based on his position falls into the same category of Judge Aileen Cannon’s roundly rebuked claim that as president Trump deserved special consideration.

He then compares a potential pardon to that issued by Gerald Ford to Richard Nixon. And even quotes Ford’s national address in which he explains that Watergate and the subsequent cover-up was:

…a tragedy in which we all have played a part. It could go on and on and on, or someone must write the end to it. I have concluded that only I can do that, and if I can, I must.

Forget the fact Nixon resigned from the presidency.  Did not incite violence. Or what may be the most important factor, several presidential historians believe Ford’s pardon sent a message that contributed, in no small part, to Trump’s belief he had a hall pass to ignore and violate the law.  Remember, Nixon told David Frost, “When a president does it, that means that is is not illegal.”  Would he have uttered these words if he had spent a few years behind bars?

Lowry does not stop there.  His next argument.

The conventional wisdom is that our politics is over-heated…having a former president stand trial in a federal criminal case, and potentially spend the rest of his life in jail, is only going to make things more intense and the country more divided.

Of course, Lowry ignores the individual most responsible for turning up the thermostat.

He goes on with what Kellyanne Conway aptly describes as alternative facts.

The Trump prosecution comes against the backdrop of the years-long Russia investigation by the FBI and special counsel Robert Mueller that cast a pall over Trump’s campaign and early presidency and that was based on gossamer thin, politically motivated information.

Is Bill Barr his ghostwriter?  Does he simply want to ignore the 140 documented contacts between Russian officials/agents and members of the Trump campaign?  Did he forget Robert Mueller was named special counsel by Trump’s own attorney general Jeff Sessions AFTER the election was over.  

He then picks up on another favorite MAGA talking point.    “It comes after Hillary Clinton got a prosecutorial pass over her “home brew” email set-up.”  Pass? Has he forgotten FBI director James Comey held a press conference, reopened the investigation and sent letters about it to Congress in violation of two FBI procedural standards: commenting on cases when the target is not charged and doing anything that could influence the outcome within 90 days of an election.  All while playing blind, deaf and dumb about the on-going Trump investigation prior to November 2016, which by he way, resulted in several convictions.

But his final argument is perhaps the most laughable.

We aren’t talking about a pardon clearing the way for another White House bid, but rather as a consolation prize for someone who is vastly diminished and looking at potentially losing his freedom, too.

Does Lowry honestly believe, even after failing to regain the presidency, Trump will go away quietly?  Does he think TFG will be any less an agent of chaos?  Apparently not.  Someone like Lowry who claims a pardoned Donald Trump will lower the temperature is as much a threat to American democracy as the cult leader himself.

POSTSCRIPT

If you live within shouting distance of the Saint Bernard Cemetery in Sharon, Connecticut, the tremors you feel this morning are not earthquake related.  It is Bill Buckley banging his fists on the lid of his coffin and screaming, “Who gave this idiot Lowry the keys to my classic car?”

For what it’s worth.
Dr. ESP

 

 

Differences (Large and Small)

Culture

One of the signature segments on Sesame Street was based on a song, “One of These Things (Is Not Like the Others),” created by Joe Raposo (music) and Jon Stone (lyrics).  The refrain was accompanied by pictures of four items, one of which was outside the general category represented by the other three. One of the earliest examples included a banana, an apple, a peach and a shoe.  I trust you can figure this out without my help.

I thought about this standard Sesame Street fare watching the cacophony of Republican voices invoking the “whataboutism” card in an effort to normalize Donald Trump’s indictment for violation of the espionage act and obstruction of justice.  Imagine Elmo or Ernie pointing at a poster with images of Trump, Joe Biden, Mike Pence and Hillary Clinton and singing to Kevin McCarthy or Lindsay Graham:

Did you guess which thing was not like the others?
Did you guess which thing just doesn’t belong?
If you guessed this one (Trump) is not like the others,
Then you’re absolutely…right!

But, as is often the case, that is not what I came here to talk about.  Today, I want to acknowledge a less obvious instance where one item or person stands out from the rest of the pack.  It was triggered by Nikki Haley’s change of heart after actually reading the Special Counsel’s indictment. What struck me was not a pivot that would give John Kerry vertigo, it was her reference to her husband.  After finally admitting Trump was “incredibly reckless with our national security,” she added:

More than that, I’m a military spouse. My husband’s about to deploy this weekend. This puts all of our military men and women in danger.

No contrition about how long it took her to reach this conclusion or her comments 24 hours earlier in which she claimed Jack Smith and his team were guilty of “prosecutorial overreach.”  Nor did she mention that Trump endangered the lives of thousands of military service men and women way before she realized, “Oh, he is endangering my husband.”

The second image is a picture of former White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney.  On July 15, 2020 Mulvaney criticized the Trump administration’s response to the spread of COVID.

I know it isn’t popular to talk about in some Republican circles, but we still have a testing problem in this country. My son was tested recently; we had to wait five to seven days for results. My daughter wanted to get tested before visiting her grandparents but was told she didn’t qualify. That is simply inexcusable at this point in the pandemic.

Again no contrition.  It only became “inexcusable” when it affected his own daughter.

Image #3 is a two-person portrait of Representative Glenn Thompson (R-PA) and then Senator Rob Portman (R-OH).  Thompson joined 75 percent of his GOP colleagues who voted against a bill to codify same-sex marriage protections just days prior to attending his son’s wedding to (drum roll) his male partner. To add insult to injury, Thompson’s office issued the following statement. “Congressman and Mrs. Thompson were thrilled to attend and celebrate their son’s marriage on Friday night as he began this new chapter in his life.”

Although Portman voted for the bill when it came before the Senate, the justification for reversal of his long-standing opposition to same-sex marriage was equally hypocritical. 

It’s a change of heart from the position of a father. Will came to Jane and me and announced that he was gay, that it was not a choice. It was who he is and he had been that way since he could remember. Jane and I were both surprised, very surprised, but also very supportive of him. Our reaction was not about policy or positions. It was about him as a son and letting him know we were 110 percent supportive of him.

No doubt, Portman would have continued to deny other parents the same opportunity to celebrate a son’s or daughter’s love for another human being if his family had not personally faced the issue.

Which brings me to image #4, Fred Guttenberg whose daughter Stephanie was killed on February 14, 2018 during the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.   Guttenberg has become a national leader in the gun safety movement since Stephanie’s death.  But he still does not feel personally exonerated for his previous indifference to the suffering of other parents.  On September 15, 2020, during a radio interview, Guttenberg said, “Every day I live with guilt I did not use my voice until it was my daughter.”

Again, I trust you do not need my help to determine which thing is not like the others.

For what it’s worth.
Dr. ESP

 

Random Thoughts 9 June 2023

Economics, Sports

If you expected a diatribe about the indictment of Donald Trump, I’m afraid you will be disappointed. Unlike a majority of GOP representatives and Senators and non-Trump contenders for the party’s nomination for president, I am keeping my powder dry until I have a chance to read the actual indictment.  So, today I want to return to my other obsession, the corrupt deal between the PGA Tour and the Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF).

WHO PAYS?

Much is being said about the $11 billion investment by the PIF being “blood money.”  Critics point to the Saudi government’s financial support of terrorism and the killing and dismemberment of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Yet little, if any, of the discussion focuses on the source of the money.  Yesterday, the BBC described the PIF as “a big pot of money – £514 billions to be exact.”  They went on to say:

The reason there’s so much cash in it is because of the massive amounts of money Saudi Arabia has made through selling oil.

Yes, the PIF is investing in golf, but they are investing with your money.  According to The Guardian:

Saudi Aramco has reported a record $161bn (£134bn) profit for 2022, the largest annual profit ever recorded by an oil and gas company, fueled by soaring energy prices and rising global demand.

The soaring prices are a direct result of Mohammed bin Salma’s decision to cut Aramco production contrary to recommendations by other OPEC oil ministers.  Producing an average barrel of crude oil costs Aramco $4.50 which is then sold to American customers today for $72.00/barrel.  In March 2023 alone, based on reported sales to the U.S. of 427,000 barrels, the PIF coffers increased by $28.8 million.  Which suggests the Saudi investment in global golf involves more than just “blood money.”  It is also extortion money.  Yesterday, the Washington Post reported:

In private, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman threatened to fundamentally alter the decades-old U.S.-Saudi relationship and impose significant economic costs on the United States if it retaliated against the oil cuts, according to a classified document obtained by The Washington Post.

As if you needed another reason to boycott the PGA Tour, just think about how much of the next increase in gas prices is going into the pockets of hypocritical PGA Tour golfers, commissioner Jay Monahan and the board of directors of the still unnamed global golf governing body.

TEED OFF

After one day, I’m still on the wagon.  I did not watch a second of TV coverage of the Canadian Open broadcast.  However, I did plan to tune into the LPGA Shoprite Classic being played in Galloway, New Jersey.  I increasingly find the women’s tour more entertaining.  The pace of play is much faster.  The ladies, so far, do not feel a need to straddle every inch between one’s ball and the hole to read a putt.  And success depends on the ability to master the full range of clubs in one’s bag rather than relying solely on a titanium driver and three wedges.

However, I am having a change of heart after reading the statement on the PGA Tour/PIF merger issued by LPGA Commissioner Mollie Marcoux Samaan.

As we have consistently said, a fractured ecosystem is not good for the game and we look forward to learning what today’s announcement means for the growth and impact of global golf. We remain focused on growing the LPGA, continuing to work with the top partners in the world to provide the best opportunity for our membership and to make sure that everything we do continues to allow us to inspire, elevate and advance opportunities for girls and women, on and off the golf course.

What message does the PIF buyout send to young girls about opportunity?  There are joint PGA/LPGA events.  Will these also fall under the umbrella of the PIF?  Does Ms. Samaan realize LPGA affiliation with the Saudi venture represents more than greed?  Is she ignoring Saudi allegiance to Sharia law and its suppression of women’s right and criminalization of homosexuality?  It is a slap in the face to female golfers and particularly openly gay LPGA professionals such as Ryan O’Toole and Georgia Hall whose story is featured during Pride Month on the tour’s website.

Hopefully, members of the women’s tour have more cajones than their male counterparts, if and when, the PIF proposes bringing the LPGA into their gold-embroidered tent.

BEST QUOTE

Kurt Streeter, golf analyst for the New York Times, summarized the PGA Tour/LIV merger this way.

The PGA Tour presented itself as the guy who calls a penalty on himself if he accidentally moves his ball a quarter-inch. Turns out it was the guy who makes a double-bogey and marks it down as a par.

For what it’s worth.
Dr. ESP