Team Normal powers forward; Team Trump brawls in a national cemetery

August 28, 2024

The Harris-Walz campaign

Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are heading to Georgia on Thursday, where both will meet with Dana Bash of CNN for an interview to air at 9 p.m. Eastern. The Harris-Walz campaign released a new ad highlighting her economic policies to help the middle class. See Harris-Walz ad on the economy | Aug 27, 2024. In short, Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are acting like candidates making a serious effort to win in 2024. “Team normal” is on message.

The Trump campaign

Donald Trump, on the other hand, was busy peddling electronic trading cards (“Buy five and receive a physical trading card with a piece of the suit Trump wore at his debate with Joe Biden.”)

The crassness of Trump's effort to commercialize his run for the presidency was exceeded only by his behavior on Monday at Arlington National Cemetery—one of the nation’s oldest military cemeteries. For understandable reasons, federal law prohibits “political campaign or election-related activities within Army National Military Cemeteries, to include photographers, content creators or any other persons attending for purposes, or in direct support of a partisan political candidate's campaign.”

The Trump campaign visited a wreath laying ceremony at Arlington for the thirteen US soldiers killed during the last days of the withdrawal from Afghanistan. Trump brought a “private photographer,” who accompanied Trump to an area of the cemetery (Area 60) reserved for burial of US soldiers recently killed in action—and off limits to photography. Trump nonethless posed for a photo in front of a grave marker while sporting a broad smile and giving a “thumbs up” hand signal.

On Tuesday, we learned more disturbing details of Trump's politicization of the Arlington National Cemetery. NPR reports that members of the Trump campaign engaged in a physical “altercation” with a member of the cemetery staff who objected to Trump's staff taking photographs in an area containing recent interments of veterans. See NPR, Trump campaign staff had altercation with official at Arlington Cemetery.

Per NPR,

A source with knowledge of the incident said the cemetery official tried to prevent Trump staffers from filming and photographing in a section where recent U.S. casualties are buried. The source said Arlington officials had made clear that only cemetery staff members would be authorized to take photographs or film in the area, known as Section 60.

When the cemetery official tried to prevent Trump campaign staff from entering Section 60, campaign staff verbally abused and pushed the official aside, according to the source.

The Trump campaign responded by saying that it had video of the incident and that a cemetery staff person “clearly suffering from a mental health episode, decided to physically block members of President Trump's team during a very solemn ceremony.”

Of course, the Trump campaign has not released the video to substantiate its defense. Claiming that a staff person doing their job was experiencing a “mental health episode” demonstrates the profound depravity of the Trump campaign—which mocks any suggestion that Trump follow rules that apply to every other American.

The bullying tactics for Trump's campaign at a military cemetery should be a national scandal. So, too, should his plan to host a “gala” to honor the insurrectionists who assaulted the Capitol on January 6. So, too, should the recent revelation that agents of the Egyptian government may have funneled $10 million to the Trump campaign in 2016. So, too, should his mental and physical deterioration—which is being ignored by the media that hounded Joe Biden out of the race.

But, no, none of that is front-page news. Instead, the media is treating Trump as a normal participant in a presidential race—rather than a candidate convicted of 34 felonies for fraud, indicted for unlawful retention of defense secrets, and indicted in federal and state court for election interference.

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Special counsel Jack Smith obtains superseding indictment against Trump

After the Supreme Court granted Trump a “Get Out of Jail Free Card” immunity opinion, special counsel Jack Smith faced the task of identifying the allegations in the current indictment that ran afoul of the Court’s holding. Rather than engage in a lengthy hearing to parse the existing indictment, Jack Smith obtained a new, superseding indictment that charged the same four felonies as the original indictment but removed references to “official duties” of President Trump. Instead, Jack Smith focused the indictment on candidate Trump. See Chris Geidner on Substack, Jack Smith attempts to immunity-proof his January 6 Trump indictment. Mostly. (lawdork.com).

Per Geidner, the superseding indictment

was not a political fight with the Court. It was, in some ways, the opposite. This was Smith and his team saying, “We will take your ruling as it is, and show you how, even under that standard, this indictment can be maintained and proven to a jury.”

Joyce Vance offers a detailed analysis of the superseding indictment (while on a hiking trip through Scotland!), so rather than repeat her fine work, I recommend it to you: Joyce Vance, Civil Discourse, A Superseding Indictment in the Election Interference Case.

Vance explains Jack Smith’s effort to comply with the Supreme Court’s immunity decision as follows:

There is no more reference to the 45th President of the United States. The indictment is now about Donald Trump, a candidate for president in 2020 who lost. In other words, following the Supreme Court’s decision on presidential immunity, the prosecution is signaling that it has abandoned claims about official presidential conduct and is only moving forward with claims about candidate Trump.

See also Lucian K. Truscott IV’s detailed analysis with helpful background, Special Counsel Jack Smith refocuses Trump indictment (substack.com).

Jack Smith is playing the long game. If Kamala Harris wins in November, Trump will spend the rest of his life trying to stay out of jail. He might delay that possibility for many years, but he will worry about it every day for the rest of his life. Yet another reason to defeat Trump—to ensure that no future president attempts to prevent the peaceful transfer of power.

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The NYTimes double standard on display, again

On Tuesday, the New York Times published a list of twenty-one questions that it would like Kamala Harris to answer about her policies. Ah, at last! The Times is covering substance! Good for the Times! I hurriedly scanned the Times for its twenty-one questions about policy that the Times would like Donald Trump to answer.

Of course, I searched in vain for a parallel set of questions that Times would like Trump to answer. No such list was to be found. Sad. Pathetic. Shameful.

Several readers commented on my post yesterday and urged me to stop criticizing the Times. Their reasons ranged from “Don’t give the Times more attention,” “I ignore those stories,” and “The stories aren’t as bad as the headlines.”

Here’s why the Times’ continued use of misleading headlines and unfair bias against Kamala Harris matter: The Times publishing empire is the world’s largest media outlet (combining all Times properties). What the Times emphasizes quickly spreads through social media and other mainstream media outlets. Rightly or wrongly, the Times has a disproportionate impact on the media narrative each day.

Tens (hundreds?) of millions who don’t read the Times are exposed to its headlines through secondary sources. When a guest essayist pens a bad-faith op-ed titled, “Trump can win on character,” tens of millions of people believe that the New York Times believes Trump's character is superior to Kamala Harris’s.

The fact that the Times’ misleading editorial practices do not fool some readers does not mean that millions of others are not misled by those same practices. The Times should be better—but it chooses not to be. It deserves the criticism that I and others heap upon it.

My criticisms of Tom Lowry’s article yesterday about Trump “winning on character” were mild compared to those leveled by other authors. I highly recommend Tom Nichols’ superb essay in The Atlantic, The conservatives who sold their souls for Trump.

Nichols uses Lowry’s “Trump can win on character” essay as a frame to explain how far the original “anti-Trump” conservatives have fallen. Nichols writes,

But principles are sometimes burdensome things; that’s part of what makes them principles. The behavior of the anti-anti-Trumpers continues to be an inexcusable betrayal of the values they once claimed to hold. Many of them spoke, even passionately, against Trump—and then they shuffled into line. And for what? One more federal judge? A few billion more dollars in the account of a donor?

It’s one thing to sell your soul cheaply. It’s another to keep taking out second and third mortgages on it until all that’s left is debt and shame.

I also recommend Jonathan V. Last’s brilliant essay The Bulwark, Why Did the New York Times Let Itself Be Used as a Mule?

Last writes, in part,

Lowry’s essay isn’t aimed at Times readers. He is not explaining reality. His op-ed does not add any value for the NYT audience.

The piece is little more than a memo to the Trump campaign. Lowry thinks he has an insight into how Trump could attack Harris, but because no one at the campaign cares what Rich has to say, he convinced the Times op-ed page to mule his ideas directly to Trump.

Why would America’s paper of record consent to be used like this by a conservative sad-sack?

So, the next time the Times gets the brilliant idea to publish twenty-one hard-hitting questions for Kamala Harris, will anyone on the newsroom or editorial staff have the self-awareness, humility, or integrity to say, “Why aren’t we subjecting Trump to the same scrutiny?” I doubt that will ever happen, but a person can dream.

Oh, and by the way, remember when the NYTimes published details of DNC emails stolen by Russian hackers? Well, the NYTimes has had possession of Trump campaign internal emails since August 11 (or thereabouts) but hasn’t published a single confidential detail. I believe that news organizations should not publish hacked or stolen materials. But wouldn’t it be nice if the NYTimes explained why it was appropriate to publish details of DNC hacked emails but not publish details from hacked emails from the Trump campaign?

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Opportunities for Reader engagement

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Today’s Edition fundraiser for Jessica Morse, CA-3

Reminder: I will be interviewing Jessica Morse on Wednesday, August 28 at 5:00 pm Pacific / 8:00 pm Eastern. Jessica is trying to flip CA-3. If you have already registered, you should have received a link. If not, please check your spam and junk folders.

Jessica Morse is running against MAGA freshman Republican Kevin Kiley.

Jessica is currently the only woman congressional challenger in California in a competitive seat, giving her an inherent advantage during an election that is swinging on women's reproductive rights. Support Jessica Morse! RSVP here.

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Focus for Democracy event on August 29

Join Focus for Democracy as we begin our sprint to the finish. We'll provide you with the information you need to maximize your impact on the election. We'll recommend cutting-edge programs that generate Democratic votes in the swing states and key races - programs that need your donations now.

Voter registration deadlines are fast approaching, so let’s ensure we don’t leave any votes on the table.

Thursday, August 29th

5:00 pm Pacific / 8:00 pm Eastern

Registration link: Focus for Democracy: The Road to 2024

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Students abroad should register to vote / receive ballots

Reader Laura Mosedale posted this note during a Zoom event I attended on Tuesday evening. If you know of someone studying abroad, please forward this information to them:

Hundreds of thousands of young Americans study abroad every year. They want to vote—and now especially—but the vast majority don’t know how the process works. The easiest way to both register to vote and request an overseas absentee ballot is students.votefromabroad.org.  

The webpage will direct students to fill out a one page form. They can usually email it to their election officials. Student studying abroad can get their ballots by email 45 days before the election — September 21— which gives them enough time to postal mail the ballot back if their state requires it. The good news is that 30 states allow for some form of electronic ballot return—email, fax, online upload—for their overseas citizen voters.

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Concluding Thoughts

I attended the “Grand Connection” Zoom on Tuesday evening. The event brought together grandparents / uncles / aunts and their grandchildren / nieces / nephews to hear 20-year-old Sam Schartz describe the “Tour To Save Democracy “—a cross-country bus trip by young people designed to encourage other young people to vote.

Sam’s description of the tour and the reception by young voters across the country was interesting on many levels. The most encouraging fact I heard was that the number of. young people who showed up at each stop doubled in size after Kamala Harris became the presumptive nominee.

Understanding what happened in July and August of 2024 will take years, but every piece of evidence suggests that something fundamental and far-reaching happened—and is still happening. Reporters in the mainstream media are still writing stories about the “honeymoon” period for Harris-Walz ending soon.

Ah, well! If it makes the media and Trump campaign feel better to deny the reality of the quake in the political firmament, so be it! The longer they delude themselves into complacency, the more distance Kamala and Tim can make up—while Trump’s staff gets into brawls at Arlington National Cemetery while desecrating the final resting place of soldiers killed in battle.

Talk to you tomorrow!

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Daily Dose of Perspective

Welcome to the world of “globular clusters.” While globular clusters do not pack the punch of a multi-colored, swirling nebula in long-exposure photographs, they are nonetheless interesting and beautiful in their own right. Indeed, when viewed through binoculars or low-powered telescopes, they appear as glittering jewels in the night sky.

What is a globular cluster? It is a group of stars that are gravitationally bound. Some clusters have hundreds of thousands of stars; some contain only a few. The formation of globular clusters is poorly understood, but most theories suggest that “globular clusters are typically the oldest objects in the galaxy and were among the first collections of stars to form.”

The globular cluster below is M13, also known as the Hercules Globular Cluster. It is 22,000 light years from Earth and contains 300,000 stars. Globular clusters are so bright that they can be captured in exposures lasting less than five minutes, compared to several-hour exposures for nebulae.

[Click on the photo to expand.]

If my photos have piqued your interest in astronomy, I have a fun suggestion. Nearly every major city has a local astronomy club that hosts “star parties” to which the public is invited. Use the Jet Propulsion Laboratory Night Sky Network (nasa.gov) to find your local astronomy group.

I strongly urge you to attend a star party—and to bring a young(er) person in your life! Giving someone the gift of seeing their first planet, nebula, or galaxy through a telescope is priceless—and will give them an appreciation of our place in the universe. What could be better?