“New York State bailed out New York City” is like saying you bailed out your roommate who pays 80% of the rent because he asked if you had a $20 on you
It is fucking crazy how right-wing this country has become in the last 15 years. The Democrats have to run the most reasonable normie to ever live so they can win a swing district by 3 points against a wife-beating Christian Nationalist who got rich scamming nursing home residents and thinks black people look like that because Satan left them in the stove too long
This is a very dark time for America. Mainstream Republican politicians speaking like old-school racists about a minority community while an all white crowd cheers and hoots.
Donald Trump, in 2016, questioned every piety and broke every rule (he questioned NATO's worth and even mocked John McCain's POW status), leading the political and media class to repeatedly pronounce his candidacy dead. But he won: because they never grasped how much people hate their elite class and therefore also hate their pieties and rules.
That anti-establishment hatred isn't the exclusive property of of Trump. In fact, Trump has utterly squandered it: there's basically no economic populism or foreign policy heterodoxy in Trump's second term, which has created a huge opening for the left to seize that mantle.
I get that if you're ensconced in DC think tank conferences or Morning Joe studios, it's Gospel that Claire Valdez's views on unions and health care and Israel are politically fatal nationwide. They're not: no more than Trump's "transgressions" were. The most potent political force by far -- not just in US politics but in the democratic world -- is hatred of establishment politics, and that has rendered almost all of the old rules entirely obsolete.
DC Democratic politicians can't embrace this kind of anti-establishment populism -- by far their most potent weapon -- because they're enslaved to a donor class that won't allow it. But their own voters are forcing it on them. Zohran's win by itself should have demonstrated all of this, but for those who didn't see it then or didn't want to, it should be extremely clear now.
I saw a comment saying the U.S. is the only country in the World Cup without universal healthcare. And I was like nahhh no way that's accurate.
20 seconds on the world wide web later, THE UNITES STATES IS THE ONLY COUNTRY IN THE WORLD CUP WITHOUT UNIVERSAL HEALTHCARE.
Charlamagne tha God: “All you do when you bring the Obamas up is remind people what is currently missing from the White House. The Obamas set a standard for decency and class and poise and intelligence. That no longer exists now. Now that bar is in hell. Satan and his demons use that bar to limbo”
It was great joining Njideka Akunyili Crosby — a gifted Nigerian-born, Los Angeles-based artist — to unveil our first portrait together. This piece reflects so many chapters of Michelle and my story, and we’re thrilled that it will be on display in the Hope and Change lobby at the Obama Presidential Center starting this Juneteenth.