HCR on 1/20/25
Heather Cox Richardson writes about the day.
Half-staff
For obvious reasons.
Joe Biden’s farewell address
Today, an oligarchy is taking shape in America of extreme wealth, power, and influence that literally threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedoms, and a fair shot for everyone to get ahead.
Two January 6s
Heather Cox Richardson writes about January 6, the 2021 and 2025 varieties.
David Gergen on the country’s future
Katherine Gergen Barnett, David Gergen’s daughter, wrote down her father’s fleetingly lucid thoughts.
One more commentary on the election
It’s by Rebecca Solnit: “Our mistake was to think we lived in a better country than we do.”
Recently updated
I’ve added Adam Kinzinger.
Other thoughts on the election
From Noah Berlatsky, Mona Charen, Mark Hurst, Bess Kalb, Adam Kinzinger, Robert Reich, Heather Cox Richardson, Margaret Sullivan.
What now?
American voters have chosen an aspiring autocrat who has promised to weak our alliances, the prosecute his political enemies, to end any effort to reverse climate change, to end of the Affordable Care Act, to end women’s reproductive rights, to hand healthcare policies over to a nutcase, and build concentration camps as the prelude to mass deporations. I could go on. If your only concern is the price of a loaf of bread (on PBS last night, David Brooks helpfully told us that it’s $1.93), you’ll vote for the strongman. The cost of groceries is a legitimate concern. But so is the cost of healthcare. And so is everything else. A vote based on the cost of a loaf of bread might come at a much greater cost.
Who?
Jonathan Capehart on PBS just now: “I’m mystified.” And: “Who are we as a country?”
Final hours
Today would be a good day to read Heather Cox Richardson’s Letters from an American.
HURRY UP PLEASE ITS TIME
A public service from The Washington Post : “Can I still register to vote?”
FORWARD
I don’t want to look like The Washington Post in not endorsing a candidate. So here’s an official endorsement: the Orange Crate Art editorial board — and owner — urge readers to vote for Kamala Harris for president.
No, John McWhorter, he’s dementing
I disagree with John McWhorter about all sorts of things — apostrophes and object pronouns, for instance. And I disagree with him about Donald Trump’s state of mind: McWhorter sees in Trump’s recent performances not dementia and disinhibition but boredom.
The blue dot and us
On the PBS News Hour tonight, “How Nebraska’s ‘blue dot’ could be the deciding factor on Election Day.”
Is it dementia yet?
Re: Trump: disinhibition is one of the many markers of dementia.
An honest editorial
From the Las Vegas Sun: “Americans from both sides of the political spectrum should be alarmed by Trump’s words and behavior. The nation must confront the fact that beyond his hateful character, he is crippled cognitively and showing clear signs of mental illness.”
An October surprise
In today’s installment of Letters from an American, Heather Cox Richardson writes about Madison Square Garden rallies, past and present.
Here’s a compelling use of sound and image
“You’ve heard Trump say these things before. But not like this”: an ad from the Lincoln Project.
Base indeed
Watching choice clips from today’s Madison Square Garden gathering, I can reach only one conclusion: Donald Trump suspects that he’s going to lose the election and is thus doing all he can he to stoke the rage of his base so that violence may follow.
Recently updated
“Do not obey in advance”: Timothy Snyder posted a short video in which he comments on the Los Angeles Times and Washingon Post in light of this first lesson.
“Do not obey in advance”
From Timothy Snyder’s On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century (New York: Tim Duggan Books, 2017): Do not obey in advance. Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given. In times like these, individuals think ahead about what a more repressive government will want, and then offer themselves without being asked. A citizen who adapts in this way is teaching power what it can do.
Trump, running as a fascist
In The Bulwark, Will Saletan offers eighteen reasons to say that Donald Trump is running as a fascist
Charles Schulz on what makes a good citizen
“Certainly all any of us can do is follow our own conscience and retain faith in our democracy. Sometimes it is the very people who cry out the loudest in favor of getting back to what they call ‘American Virtues’ who lack this faith in our country.”
Voter registration deadlines
Voter registration deadlines are approaching soon. Find them at https://vote.gov/register.
Choice bits from Jack Smith’s filing
I find some of the details of Mike Pence’s efforts to persuade Donald Trump to accept an election loss bizarre and illuminating. These moments make me think of a parent trying to soothe an angry, tantrum-prone toddler.
Yesterday in Wisconsin
Donald Trump, lying, rambling, and rasping his way through the day.
“A September to remember”
The historian Timothy Snyder writes about “Trump’s Hitlerian month,” or “a September to remember.” With a discussion of the objection to making comparisons.
Cleanup on aisle 45
Kamala Harris: “What we have done is clean up Donald Trump’s mess.”
“Red flags for scholars of fascism”
Heather Cox Richardson: “Trump has always invented his stories from whole cloth, but there used to be some way to tie them to reality. Today that seemed to be gone. He was in a fantasy world, and his rhetoric was apocalyptic. It was also bloody in ways that raise huge red flags for scholars of fascism.”