House Of Cards

Democrats would need to win 30 seats to take the House back.  In January, that was considered impossible, that there simply weren't enough competitive House Republican seats to try to pick up. You can thank Donald Trump and Ted Cruz for fixing that problem.  The latest Cook Political Report on the House now puts 31 GOP seats in striking distance and 42 in possible play in total.



So yes, considering things are bad enough for the GOP with Trump as the frontrunner that Utah could be a competitive swing state come November, the wipeout of Republicans downticket could become a reality.

Now it's March and there's a long, grueling, ugly campaign ahead for 33 Senate seats and 435 House seats in addition to the White House, so who knows how many Republicans will be able to decouple themselves from Trump and survive.  Or not.  But at this point a Goldwater-style realignment isn't out of the question anymore like it was just eight weeks ago.

And this analysis too will change as we get closer to November.

StupidiNews!

• European terror officials have many questions to deal with after the arrest and capture of Paris attack suspect Salah Abdeslam over the weekend in Belgium.
• Colombia's FARC rebels will meet with US Secretary of State John Kerry as part of President Obama's historic visit to Cuba on Monday.
• North Korea has again fired short-range missiles into the Sea of Japan after similar missile tests on Friday, as part of a protest against annual US-South Korean joint military exercises.
• Brazil is dealing with former President Lula da Silva's appointment as current President Dilma Rouseff's chief of staff amid protests demanding Rouseff's impeachment on corruption charges.
• NASA astronaut Jeff Williams will be the first astronaut to serve three stints aboard the International Space Station as his ship docked successfully with the ISS on Friday.

Last Call For Viva Cu-Bama

The First Family made an historic visit to Cuba today, the first US President to step on US soil in decades, as the president will address the Cuban people in Havana this week.

President Barack Obama touched down in Cuba on Sunday, definitively ending a half-century of estrangement in a dramatic personal demonstration of his core foreign policy principle of engaging America's enemies. 

It's a shift that the change-minded president hopes will nudge the Communist government here to grant more freedoms to its people and open new economic channels for American businesses. The President and his allies also hope a successful détente will offer something bigger: a lasting example of diplomacy's power in dealing with longtime foes. 

Just before Obama stepped from Air Force One -- carrying an umbrella as a persistent rain fell on the tarmac -- he sent a message to Cubans on a platform that until recently would have been unheard of in the repressive regime. 

"¿Que bolá Cuba?" he wrote on Twitter, using an informal Cuban greeting. "Just touched down here, looking forward to meeting and hearing directly from the Cuban people."

This will share President Obama's foreign policy legacy along with Syria.  I'm hoping more attention is paid to how important normalizing relations with Cuba is.

We'll see.

Trump Cards, Con't

Can we call Trump and his supporters a threat to the country yet, folks?

VIOLENCE at another Donald Trump rally, this time in Tucson, AZ. Man hits and kicks protester: pic.twitter.com/7FWuSeE0Jt

— Frank Thorp V (@frankthorpNBC) March 19, 2016

NBC News reporter Frank Thorp caught video of a man swinging at a protester at Trump’s Tucson, Arizona rally on Saturday and appearing to kick and stomp while the protester was on the ground.

The video shows the man taking swings at a person who is apparently down on the ground as security and police rush over to the area. The man then continues striking the person with his feet but is stopped when police handcuff him.

The video does not show what prompted the violence.

Video taken at the same rally reportedly show’s Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, roughly grabbing the collar of a protester and yanking him. Lewandowski himself was accused of violence for grabbing and yanking a female reporter for conservative website Breitbart earlier this week.

Here is Donald Trump's campaign manager in the Tucson crowd grabbing the collar of a protester. pic.twitter.com/JZ9RntWlHY

— Jacqueline Alemany (@JaxAlemany) March 19, 2016

Not going to be long now before we get to the lynchings and the lethal stuff, right?  Campaign's young.  Just wait until these guys figure out they will be denied their glorious white rule by voters in the general...

Sunday Long Read: Working Out

If you're not familiar with Adam Neumann and his company, WeWork, you very soon will be. Neumann is on a multi-billion dollar quest to reinvent the American workplace for the era of internet automation and the 24/7 contractor job, where everyone lives, works, and plays together in the same place, the ultimate extension of urban planning.

Neumann and his cofounder, Miguel McKelvey, founded WeWork in 2010 with a simple business model: The company rents office space from landlords wholesale, breaks it into smaller units, and subleases it at a profit. WeWork, which now has 77 locations and more than 50,000 members, says its ultimate potential is much bigger—and investors agree. In February 2014, WeWork’s backers valued the company at $1.5 billion; by last week, its valuation had jumped to $16 billion, making WeWork, on paper, the world’s 6th most valuable private startup.

Every modern generation has sought to remake the workplace, from the introduction of the cubicle in the 1960s to the 1990s’ foosball tables and flexible hours. Now members of the generation that would rather make a job than take a job are embracing coworking environments where they can operate independently while still drawing support and networking opportunities from peers. Neumann calls these people the We Generation, which, he says, "cares about the world, actually wants to do cool things, and loves working."

Critics look at WeWork’s business model of trading spaces and shrug, That’s it? Its high valuation has made it a staple of lists predicting which unicorn startups will fail. "Their multiples are more like a tech company than what a real estate company would get," says Charles Clinton, who runs a real-estate-funding platform called EquityMultiple. "There’s a feeling that that doesn’t really make sense." If the economy wobbles, skeptics contend, WeWork’s customers will scurry back to cafés with free Wi-Fi.

Neumann, who was envisioning WeWork with 100 buildings when he had only two, sees his company as an operating system that brings real estate to life in the same way that Android is an operating system that makes a smartphone more than mere glass and metal. As more spaces open and members join the network, WeWork will have increasing power to offer such services as shipping, software, credit cards, travel, payroll, banking, and training. Eventually, members might join for these benefits alone, without any physical access whatsoever. Neumann also envisions WeWork managing offices on behalf of corporations (which are cutting down on square footage per employee). WeWork will connect them all through an app-based network. "Real estate," according to Neumann, "is just a tool."

He isn’t content simply to remake the modern office; he also wants to change how millennials think about home. WeLive, his new "co-living" residences, is a bet that they’ll value access over ownership. Just like they’re choosing Uber or Lyft rather than buying a car or subscribing to Spotify rather than having a record collection, they will be happy to share their living space, too. The first WeLive, which features common amenities with modest personal spaces, opened in New York City in January. According to leaked financial documents, the company plans to open 68 more in the next two years, the first step toward WeWork creating entire neighborhoods. "It’s a when, not an if," Neumann says of  WeCities.

Of course, in order to follow through on any of these plans, WeWork needs to convince young, urban professionals to buy into its philosophy of living and working together. Which is why, in addition to square footage, WeWork runs on something that doesn’t easily fit on a term sheet. You can call it a mission, a vibe, or culture. Neumann calls it "energy." If anyone can create energy, it’s him. But is it enough to power WeWorld?

On one hand, this is where the corporate workplace is going in the United States, global companies with a majority of contractors, work-at-home options and the 24/7 work schedule.  On the other hand, all of that is just there to create "productivity" by enslaving us.

But Neumann sure as hell is going to get rich off this.  You?  Not so much.

America's Right-Wing Domestic Terrorism Problem, Con't

A jury took about an hour to convict a right-wing "sovereign citizen" on a terrorism threat charge as he apparently made conference calls instructing people to plan to overthrow West Virginia's state government.

Thomas David Deegan, 39, was found guilty on one count of making a terrorist threat on Friday, after the 12-member jury deliberated for only an hour. He faces 1 to 3 years in prison and a fine of $5,000 to $25,000 when he is sentenced, in April.

Deegan, who represented himself in court, was accused of the plot, which he spoke about in a conference call that was recorded in September.

“The conversation was the actual crime itself,” prosecutor Jason Wharton told MetroNews. “The jury was able to hear the entirety of the conference call as well as some recordings from the regional jail and some other testimony.”

He told participants on the call to shoot anyone who resists them.

He said on the call that he wanted to bring a large number of people to the West Virginia capitol building in Charleston and overtake the building. Deegan denied the charges.

“It was one of 12 calls and was taken out of context,” he said. “I have studied laws and I see where they are going wrong. I just find errors. I never called myself a sovereign citizen.”

According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, Deegan intended to “remove several state government leaders from their offices, charge them with treason and replace them with sovereign citizens. After apparently setting up a sovereign citizen-style court system, those found guilty of treason would be put to death.”

He also discussed sending armed militants to local police departments.

“We are at war,” Deegan said during one of the conference calls, according to the criminal complaint. “The more that come to Charleston, the less [likelihood] for bloodshed.”

He also said, “If you see the police coming and pulling up in a vehicle, I suggest you shoot them.”

So this joker here is openly threatening to kill cops, kidnap or kill state government officials, and get into firefights, but the real problem in America is Black Lives Matter, right?

The Dump Trump Truck Gains Speed

Donald Trump ran into significant disruptions from protesters in both NYC and Arizona events today, yet another sign that if there's one good thing Trump has accomplished, it's getting Americans to take interest in the politics of stopping idiot Republicans.

Dozens of protesters blocked traffic near a Donald Trump event in Arizona on Saturday, while demonstrators marched in New York City to protest the GOP front-runner.

The protesters in Arizona parked vehicles sideways on Shea Boulevard, blocking both lanes of traffic into Fountain Hills, Arizona, where Trump held a rally Saturday afternoon, Maricopa County Sheriff's Office Deputy Joaquin Enriquez told CNN.

Enriquez described Shea Boulevard as the main artery into the area and the protesters' actions were causing motorists to drive into oncoming traffic as they tried to get around them. Traffic was backed up for miles due to the blockage. 

"This is causing huge issues for us," Enriquez told CNN. He added, "We obviously have to get this road open."

Enriquez later told CNN that three protesters were arrested and two cars were towed from the boulevard. The deputy emphasized that the arrests were due to protesters blocking the roadway, not because of the protest itself.

Protests at Trump rallies increasingly have become more contentious in recent days. Friday night, protesters outside a Trump rally in Salt Lake City, Utah, tried to breach the venue's doors, causing police officers and Secret Service officers to abruptly shut them as Trump was speaking. And last week, scuffles between protesters and supporters in Chicago led Trump to cancel a rally there.

Trump on Saturday appeared with former Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer and Maricopa Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who endorsed the GOP front-runner in January. Arpaio rose to conservative fame with his aggressive roundups of undocumented immigrants and attention-grabbing tactics like clothing inmates in pink underwear.

Speaking to CNN's Fredricka Whitfield earlier in the day, Arpaio said authorities are "going to do everything we can to continue to have this rally," adding that authorities are "ready for any problems."

"We'll do everything possible to make sure we have free speech in this country. Donald Trump has a right to speak out and the people have a right to go in there and hear him speak," Arpaio said. "If certain groups don't like it, that's OK. They have freedom of speech, but they're not going to violate any laws. They're going to have to pay the consequences."

By all means Trump, let's have more footage of your brownshirt goons saying they'll round up the people who oppose you in order to make them pay the consequences.  I really do want that massive Democratic wave to obliterate the modern GOP out of existence in 2016.

The Consequence Of It All

Yet another reminder that protection of your First Amendment rights are guaranteed by the Constitution. Protection from the consequences of exercising those rights are not.

If Georgia chooses to turn the “religious liberty” bill into law, be prepared: Atlanta may not get a Super Bowl.

That was the suggestion from the NFL on Friday when the league released a statement in response to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s question about whether the league had any position on Georgia House Bill 757.

The statement from league spokesman Brian McCarthy reads, “NFL policies emphasize tolerance and inclusiveness, and prohibit discrimination based on age, gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, or any other improper standard. Whether the laws and regulations of a state and local community are consistent with these policies would be one of many factors NFL owners may use to evaluate potential Super Bowl host sites.”

Falcons owner Arthur Blank has hoped to land multiple Super Bowls in the team’s new stadium, which is scheduled to open in 2017. The NFL has previously moved a Super Bowl from Arizona to the Rose Bowl near Los Angeles in the 1992 season after that state refused to recognize the Martin Luther King holiday.

Indeed, all three of Atlanta's major sports franchises oppose the bill.

Falcons owner Arthur Blank then issued this statement:

“One of my bedrock values is ‘Include Everyone’ and it’s a principle we embrace and strive to live each and every day with my family and our associates, a vast majority of which live and work in Georgia. I strongly believe a diverse, inclusive and welcoming Georgia is critical to our citizens and the millions of visitors coming to enjoy all that our great state has to offer. House Bill 757 undermines these principles and would have long-lasting negative impact on our state and the people of Georgia.”

And then the Atlanta Braves and Atlanta Hawks weighed in:

“The Atlanta Braves organization believes that House Bill 757 is detrimental to our community and bad for Georgia. Our organization believes in an environment that is inclusive of all people. In addition to allowing discrimination against citizens of this state, the bill will have a profoundly negative impact on our organization. As a Georgia business and employer, we proudly support Georgia Prospers in its goal to ensure that the state’s workplaces and communities are diverse and welcoming for all people, no matter one’s race, sex, color, national origin, ethnicity, religion, age, disability, sexual orientation, or gender identity. We are proud to represent Georgia and are opposed to any law that endorses discrimination against anyone.” 

The Hawks’ organization said:

“For generations, Atlanta has stood at the forefront of civil rights and its diversity is what has made this city a cultural leader in the Southeast. The Hawks strongly believe in the values of inclusion, diversity and equal rights, core principles by which we operate our business and are essential elements in making Atlanta a leading global city.”

Your enshrined bigotry in the name of "religious freedom" will have consequences, Georgia.  Are you prepared to deal with them?

States Of Chaos

Over at New York Magazine, Eric Levitz argues that what the GOP has in store for America should they win the whole enchilada in 2017 is what the smoking wrecks of Louisiana and Kansas are now after years of total GOP control.

In 2010, the tea-party wave put Sam Brownback into the Sunflower State’s governor’s mansion and Republican majorities in both houses of its legislature. Together, they implemented the conservative movement’s blueprint for Utopia: They passed massive tax breaks for the wealthy and repealed all income taxes on more than 100,000 businesses. They tightened welfare requirements, privatized the delivery of Medicaid, cut $200 million from the education budget, eliminated four state agencies and 2,000 government employees. In 2012, Brownback helped replace the few remaining moderate Republicans in the legislature with conservative true believers. The following January, after signing the largest tax cut in Kansas history, Brownback told the Wall Street Journal, “My focus is to create a red-state model that allows the Republican ticket to say, 'See, we've got a different way, and it works.' "

As you’ve probably guessed, that model collapsed. Like the budget plans of every Republican presidential candidate, Brownback’s “real live experiment” proceeded from the hypothesis that tax cuts for the wealthy are such a boon to economic growth, they actually end up paying for themselves (so long as you kick the undeserving poor out of their welfare hammocks). The Koch-backed Kansas Policy Institute predicted that Brownback’s 2013 tax plan would generate $323 million in new revenue. During its first full year in operation, the plan produced a $688 million loss. Meanwhile, Kansas’s job growth actually trailed that of its neighboring states. With that nearly $700 million deficit, the state had bought itself a 1.1 percent increase in jobs, just below Missouri’s 1.5 percent and Colorado’s 3.3.

Those numbers have hardly improved in the intervening years. In 2015, job growth in Kansas was a mere 0.1 percent, even as the nation’s economy grew 1.9 percent. Brownback pledged to bring 25,000 new jobs to the state in his second term; as of January, he has brought 700. What’s more,personal income growth slowed dramatically since the tax cuts went into effect. Between 2010 and 2012, Kansas saw income growth of 6.1 percent, good for 12th in the nation; from 2013 to 2015, that rate was 3.6 percent, good for 41st.

Meanwhile, revenue shortfalls have devastated the state’s public sector along with its most vulnerable citizens. Since Brownback’s inauguration, 1,414 Kansans with disabilities have been thrown off Medicaid. In 2015, six school districts in the state were forced to end their years early for lack of funding. Cuts to health and human services are expected to cause 65 preventable deaths this year in Sedgwick County alone. In February, tax receipts came in $53 million below estimates; Brownback immediately cut $17 million from the state’s university system. This data is not lost on the people of Kansas — as of November, Brownback’s approval rating was 26 percent, the lowest of any governor in the United States.

Louisiana under Jindal fared no better.

Louisiana has replicated these results. When Bobby Jindal moved into the governor’s mansion in 2008, he inherited a $1 billion surplus. When he moved out last year, Louisiana faced a $1.6 billion projected deficit. Part of that budgetary collapse can be put on the past year's plummeting oil prices. The rest should be placed on Jindal passing the largest tax cut in the state's history and then refusing to reverse course when the state's biggest industry started tanking. Jindal's giveaway to the wealthiest citizens in the country's second-poorest state cost Louisiana roughly $800 million every year. To make up that gap, Jindal slashed social services, raided the state’s rainy-day funds, and papered over the rest with reckless borrowing. Today, the state is scrambling to resolve a $940 million budget gap for this fiscal year, with a $2 billion shortfall projected for 2017. Like Bizarro Vermont, Louisiana can no longer afford to provide public defenders for all its criminal defendants. Its Department of Children and Family Services may soon be unable to investigate every reported instance of child abuse. Education funding is down 44 percent since Jindal took office. The state’s hospitals are likely to see at least $64 million in funding cuts this year.

What has happened to these states should be a national story; because we are one election away from it being our national story. Ted Cruz claims his tax plan will cost less than $1 trillion in lost revenue over the next ten years. Leaving aside the low bar the Texas senator sets for himself — my giveaway to the one percent will cost a bit less than the Iraq War! — Cruz only stays beneath $1 trillion when you employ the kind of “dynamic scoring” that has consistently underestimated the costs of tax cuts in Kansas. Under a conventional analysis, the bill runs well over $3 trillion, with 44 percent of that lost money accruing to the one percent. John Kasich’s tax plan includes cutting the top marginal rate by more than ten percent along with a similar cut to the rates on capital gains and business taxes. Even considering Kasich’s appetite for Social Security cuts, his plan must rely on the same supply-side voodoo that Kansas has so thoroughly discredited. As for the most likely GOP nominee, even with dynamic scoring, his tax cuts would cost $10 trillion over the next ten years, with 40 percent of that gargantuan sum filling the pockets of Trump’s economic peers.

If any of these men are elected president, they will almost certainly take office with a House and Senate eager to scale up the “red-state model.” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has said of Brownback’s Kansas, “This is exactly the sort of thing we (Republicans) want to do here, in Washington, but can’t, at least for now.” Speaker of the House Paul Ryan’s celebrated budgets all depend on the same magical growth that has somehow escaped the Sunflower State.

In other words, the economic collapse into recession that now plagues Louisiana and Kansas is what will be in store for all of America should the Republicans take the White House and keep control of Congress.  America will collapse, both figuratively and literally.

We talk here a lot about how Donald Trump simply cannot be allowed to be in the White House, but no Republican can be allowed.  Kansas and Louisiana are proof that austerity is an abject and total failure, and yet that's what Republicans want to force for all 50 states.

The Ringleader Of The Circus

Trump's major super power (besides his reality-defying hair) is his ability to manipulate the American media like no other candidate before him.  Trump's ruthless "branding" negotiation have exposed how corrupt our news organizations are: if they want access to Trump and his ratings, then they have to pay Trump's price.

Staffers at the five major television networks are grappling with what role their organizations may have played in amplifying Donald Trump’s successful campaign of insults, generalizations about minority groups, and at times flat lies. 

Conversations with more than a dozen reporters, producers, and executives across the major networks reveal internal tensions about the wall-to-wall coverage Trump has received and the degree to which the Republican frontrunner has — or hasn’t — been challenged on their air.

Two network sources also confirmed the unprecedented control the television networks have surrendered to Trump in a series of private negotiations, allowing him to dictate specific details about placement of cameras at his event, to ensure coverage consists primarily of a single shot of his face. 

Network officials say the ratings have born out commercial incentives to devote their campaign coverage to largely unfiltered streams of Trump talking. CBS CEO Les Moonves quipped that Trump “may not be good for America, but it’s damn good for CBS, that’s all I got to say.” 

But many inside the networks are growing increasingly disturbed with what they’ve helped create. 

“As a programmer, it’s an easy decision, people watch it,” said one producer. “As an American, I’m sort of troubled by it, because I feel like we contribute it.” 

While there are journalists who have aggressively challenged Trump — notably Fox News’ Megyn Kelly, NBC News’ Chuck Todd, and CNN’s Jake Tapper — much of the coverage, including broadcasting his rallies and events live in their entirety, has been uncritical and even unfiltered, some of it conducted by interviewers unwilling or unable to provide much more than a platform for the candidate. 

Several network and cable news staffers rationalized the amount of Trump coverage as a response to the demand of the viewers and as accurately reflecting his position in the race. 

It’s an argument CNN’s president, Jeff Zucker, has made publicly. When asked if he felt responsible for Trump’s rise, he reportedly told reporters at a lunch this week that “the frontrunner of the party is always going to get a disproportionate amount of attention.” 

Some blamed the other Republicans in the race for being unwilling to attack Trump publicly. Many are unsure of how to cover a candidate like this — one seemingly immune to the traditional expectations of honesty and respect for democratic norms — in this medium.

In 2016 America where reality TV and politics are interchangeable, Trump is the perfect candidate to completely exploit the notion of news media as an entertainment product sold by for-profit corporate business interests and not a check on power as a public good.  Trump was inevitable, given how bad the Village has been for the last 25 years.

And now they worry about the monster they've enabled?

I'd laugh, only the joke's on all of us.