From Sean McElwee’s “The GOP’s stunning election advantage: How Republicans captured Congress–and how Democrats can win it back: A remarkable new study highlights the crucial role turnout plays in Republican victories“: “CCES data suggest that 23 percent of of nonvoters in 2010 and 27 percent of nonvoters in 2012 said they didn’t vote because they weren’t registered, the most frequently cited reason of all. Among those who only voted in presidential years, disliking the candidates, lack of information and business were the top reasons for not voting in midterm elections. Among the small group (4 percent) of Americans who only voted in midterms, busyness and disliking the candidates were the top reasons for abstaining…Both data sources suggest that core voters are older, whiter, richer and better educated than nonvoters and presidential-only voters. This leads to different partisan identification: nonvoters were mostly either Independents (30 percent) or Democrats (43 percent). Presidential-only voters tilt the most strongly toward the Democrats, with 53 percent saying they are Democrats and only 32 percent identifying as Republican… According to CCES, nonvoters prefered Obama to Romney by a margin of 52 percent to 32 percent, and presidential-only voters preferred him 60 percent to 37 percent. However, core voters preferred Romney over Obama, 49 percent to 48 percent. If presidential elections were decided by core voters, Romney might well have won.”
In his NYT op-ed, “A User’s Guide to the Dark Art of Politics,” Democratic strategist Bret Di Resta illuminates the importance — and the art — of good opposition research.
Robert Reich’s “What to Do About Disloyal Corporations” at HuffPo makes a persuasive case for removing a broad range of economic incentives for companies like Pfizer, which leave the U.S. to avoid taxes. Reich’s argument is succinctly stated in a way that Democratic candidates could articulate in connecting with American workers who are concerned about export of jobs. One of his soundbites: “If Pfizer or any other American corporation wants to leave America to avoid U.S. taxes, that’s their business. But they should no longer get any of the benefits of American citizenship — because they’ve stopped paying for them.”
Bill Moyers and Michael Kinship take no prisoners in their HuffPo post “The GOP on the Eve of Destruction” and provide Democrats with an eloquent summation of Republican damage to our society. “…The Republicans seem to have made up their minds: they will divide, degrade and secede from the Union…They will do so with bullying, lies and manipulation, a willingness to say anything, no matter how daft or wrong. They will do so by spending unheard of sums to buy elections with the happy assistance of big business and wealthy patrons for whom the joys of gross income inequality are a comfortable fact of life. By gerrymandering and denying the vote to as many of the poor, the elderly, struggling low-paid workers, and people of color as they can. And by appealing to the basest impulses of human nature: anger, fear and bigotry.”
At The L.A. Times David Lauter and Evan Halper explain “How the San Bernardino attack has reshaped the political debate — and the 2016 election.”
Patrick Healy and Maggie Haberman of the New York Times peel back the layers of demagogic rhetoric that define Trump’s messaging and find…a demagogue. “Several historians watched Mr. Trump’s speeches last week, at the request of The Times, and observed techniques — like vilifying groups of people and stoking the insecurities of his audiences — that they associate with Wallace and McCarthy…”His entire campaign is run like a demagogue’s — his language of division, his cult of personality, his manner of categorizing and maligning people with a broad brush,” said Jennifer Mercieca, an expert in American political discourse at Texas A&M University.”
Rising xenophobia in wake of Paris massacre boosts right-wing in Ipsos-Sopra poll.
Mark Murray reports at MSNBC.com on findings from a new MSNBC/Telemundo/Marist poll regarding political attitudes following the terrorist shootings in San Bernardino: “Americans are split on their biggest worry, with 36 percent saying it’s a terrorist attack and 31 percent saying it’s gun violence, according to a new MSNBC/Telemundo/Marist poll…Another 17 said their biggest worry is being a victim of police brutality. The results break down along partisan and racial lines: 60 percent of Republicans say being a victim of a terrorist attack is their biggest concern, versus just 22 percent of Democrats who say that… Conversely, 40 percent of Democrats single out being a victim of gun violence as their biggest worry, compared with just 20 percent of Republicans saying that. And 41 percent of African Americans indicate their biggest concern is being a victim of police brutality, versus just 11 percent of whites who say that.”
And Oscar Williams-Grut spells out “Here’s where terrorist groups like ISIS and Al Qaeda get their money” at Business Insider.

Looks like the mass shooting in San Bernadino may spark yet another round of Islamophobia, egged on by right-wing media. The tragedy has also ignited a fierce debate among voters about the value of politicians’ “thoughts and prayers” vs. gun control again.
WaPo’s Sean Sullivan reports “How the 2016 presidential candidates are reacting to the California mass shooting.” Maybe it’s time for the media to make Republicans flesh out the “thoughts” part of their “thoughts and prayers” bromide a bit.
The FiveThirtyEight Gang, Nate Silver, Micah Cohen and Harry Enten have a conversation to test Silver’s view that Donald Trump probably ain’t gonna get the GOP nomination. Among Silver’s more persuasive points: “Polls don’t mean much at this stage and aren’t very predictive…A polling front-runner wins more often than not when the front-runner is at 50 percent in the polls, like Hillary Clinton is now. But Trump’s at 25-30 percent nationally and a bit less than that in Iowa…It’s not just that Trump has no support from his party. It’s that the party is actively looking to stop him because he’d be a catastrophe as their nominee.” I’m going way out on a limb here and say that any crazy thing can happen, especially with such a large field of flawed candidates.
NYT’s First Draft explains why “Senate Republicans Up for Re-Election Are Urged to Keep Distance From Donald Trump“: “”Let’s face facts. Trump says what’s on his mind and that’s a problem,” wrote Ward Baker, the executive director of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. “Our candidates will have to spend full time defending him or condemning him if that continues. And, that’s a place we never, ever want to be. It is certain that all GOP candidates will be tied in some way to our nominee, but we need not be tied to him so closely that we have to engage in permanent cleanup or distancing maneuvers.””
The Upshot’s Nate Cohn explains how the Trump campaign impacts the debate about the pros and cons of telephone vs. online polls.
NYT conservative columnist Russ Douthat concedes “Whether or not we want to call Trump a fascist outright, then, it seems fair to say that he’s closer to the “proto-fascist” zone on the political spectrum than either the average American conservative or his recent predecessors in right-wing populism…Trump may indeed be a little fascistic, but that sinister resemblance is just one part of his reality-television meets WWE-heel-turn campaign style. He isn’t actually building a fascist mass movement (he hasn’t won a primary yet!) or rallying a movement of far-right intellectuals (Ann Coulter notwithstanding). His suggestion that a Black Lives Matter protester at one of his rallies might have deserved to be roughed up was pretty ugly, but still several degrees of ugly away from the actual fascist move, which would require organizing a paramilitary force to take to the streets to brawl with the decadent supporters of our rotten legislative government.” Scant comfort, that.
The Fix’s Chris Cillizza sheds what was left of his already diaphanous nonpartisan veil to offer this advice directly to Bush III and Right to Rise, his Super-PAC: “Take all of the ad time Right to Rise has reserved in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina and turn the firehose on full blast against Trump. I am talking about a sustained ad campaign whose sole aim is to disqualify Trump — not boost Bush. Sure, Bush and Right to Rise have jabbed at Trump — and a John Kasich super PAC has gone into full attack mode against The Donald — but no one other than the Bush forces have the money to maintain a sustained negative ad campaign against Trump in, at least, the first three voting states…Bush — and the broader establishment that he represents — needs to understand that these are desperate times for them. Standing on the sidelines is no longer a viable option. Waiting for someone else to do it won’t work. Someone needs to step up and try to take Trump out if, indeed, the establishment believes that The Donald as the party’s nominee is a catastrophic situation…No one is better positioned — or has less to lose — than Bush and Right to Rise. It’s time to take a chance.”
Washington Post op-ed columnist Harold Meyerson has some simpler advice for Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton to help build unity among Democratic progressives: “She should say that if elected president, she’d subject the Wall Streeters to a higher tax rate than anyone else.”
Crystal Ball’s Larry J. Sabato and Kyle Kondik provide some insight into calendar considerations for any independent candidacy bid by Donald Trump, or anyone else: “The calendar will help to determine whether there’s a truly prominent third-party candidate on the ballot. Filing deadlines for independent presidential candidates vary by state, but a majority fall in August. That is after the conventions — 38 states’ deadlines are after the RNC ends on July 21 — but not so far after them that a spurned candidate could easily turn around and get on many state ballots. A candidate who wants to get on every ballot will have to start much earlier than that: For instance, the deadline for an independent to get on the ballot in Texas, the second-biggest state, is May 9. So maybe it would be helpful to the Republicans if Trump hangs around in the primary — so long as he doesn’t win the nomination — just long enough for a national third-party bid to be out of reach.”

Sean McElwee probes “The truth about the white working class: Why it’s really allergic to voting for Democrats” at Salon.com. Among McElwee’s findings, “I examined raw vote shares among working class whites, and then vote shares among working class whites in the South (the former 11 states of the Confederacy) and non-South. Immediately, it is obvious that a key divide is the South/non-South distinction: only 28 percent of Southern working class whites identify as Democratic, compared with 40 percent of non-South working class whites.” McElwee also makes a strong case that Dems have failed to register, educate and turn out low-income voters in their base.
Syndicated Washington Post columnist E. J. Dionne, Jr. observes, “One of the tasks of political analysis is to make sense of conflicting information, and a new book by Stanley Greenberg, who was a political scientist before he became a Democratic pollster, does not shy away from the messiness of our social and electoral landscape. My Dickensian “best of times, worst of times” analysis is drawn partly from Greenberg’s new book, “America Ascendant.” In it Greenberg sees Republicans in a long-term demographic “death spiral.” But the book is also unsparing in acknowledging that Democratic weaknesses among older white and rural voters leave the GOP “almost unopposed in nearly half of the states.””
It may be wishful thinking on the part of Republican strategists, but there is already talk in at least one conservative e-rag that the “GOP establishment to back Hillary if Trump nominee.”
But has the long-awaited tanking of Trump finally begun? It looks like his Trumped-up African American pastors endorsement extravaganza has been scaled back.
Trump has denied that he recently mocked a physically-disabled reporter. But these two photos from the incident raise doubts. People with disabilities, their families and friends include a hefty part of the voting public. In 2010 there were more than 56 million disabled people in the U.S, according to the Census.
At Daily Kos Steve Singiser considers an interesting question:, “Another barrier to Democratic down-ballot majorities: Are Democratic voters more ‘bipartisan’?” and notes, “there is more to the gradual decline of Democratic support at the state legislative level than mere gerrymandering. This week, we explore the possibility that Democrats are hamstrung, even if slightly, by a tendency of their “soft” supporters being more willing to reach across the aisle and support legislative Republicans than the converse. Indeed, we have heard much about asymmetric polarization. The decline in split-ticket voting (which has been well documented), it appears, may be happening asymmetrically, as well.” Singer and Kos crunched relevant data and found that only 13.4 percent of state legislative seats are in ‘split ticket’ legislative districts, with 62 percent held by Republican officeholders occupying seats carried by President Obama in 2012. Only 38 percent were Democratic officeholders in districts carried by Romney in 2012.
Michael Tomasky’s Daily Beast post, “The GOP’s Climate Moderates Are Losing” explains that the few GOP presidential candidates who address climate change seriously have no real chance of nomination — which should help Democrats turn out and win young voters.
Does Rand Paul’s dismal performance as a presidential candidate make his senate seat vulnerable? Joseph Gerth reports at the Louisville Courier Journal that Democrats are shopping around for a challenger. “Talk in the party has largely settled around actress Ashley Judd and state Veterans Affairs Commissioner Heather French Henry, and there are some in the party who are holding out hope that some wealthy business person who’s not been involved in politics before will step forward.” Despite recent Democratic Kentucky Democratic losses, state party Chair Patrick Hill adds, “”We have some strong candidates who might be able to take advantage of some excitement on the national level.” John Cheves of the Lexington Herald Leader reports that the just re-elected Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes “has declined to say if she’ll make another run for higher office, such as challenging Republican U.S. Sen. Rand Paul in his re-election bid next year.” If Clinton is nominated the Democrats’ 2016 candidate, however, she will certainly consider running to take advantage of the possibility of a strong turnout of women.
Hunter Walker explains why “The shooting at Planned Parenthood put GOP 2016 hopefuls in a ‘politically uncomfortable’ position” at Yahoo.com.

A brutal truth about political messaging from NY Times frequent commenter Mathew Carnicelli: “I think the Democrats are hideous at shaping message,” he said. “They try something for about 10 minutes and when it doesn’t poll well immediately, they drop it. With Republicans, they keep repeating the same message until people believe them.”
Alternet’s Kali Holloway explains “How Delusional Nostalgia Is Killing the White Working Class.” Holloway rounds up data from several public opinion surveys, including The 2015 American Values Survey, and notes “On “reverse racism,” half of white Americans overall agree “discrimination against whites is as big a problem today as discrimination against blacks and other minorities.” But the socioeconomic divide on this opinion is fairly vast. Among working-class whites, a solid majority, 60 percent, believe the tables have turned and anti-white discrimination equals that faced by other historically marginalized racial and ethnic groups. But just 36 percent of college-educated white Americans cosigned this idea. Blacks and Hispanics overwhelmingly reject the notion, by 75 and 71 percent, respectively.”
Just a few weeks before he leaves office, outgoing Democratic Governor Steve Beshear of Kentucky has issued an executive order that immediately granted the right to vote to about 140,000 nonviolent felons who have completed their sentences. As Erik Eckholm reports at the NYT, “Kentucky had been one of just three states imposing a lifetime voting ban on felons unless they received a special exemption from the governor. Florida and Iowa still carry the lifetime ban…Convicted criminals in Maine and Vermont do not lose their franchise in the first place and can cast ballots from prison….Despite the policy changes in many states, almost six million Americans are prohibited from voting because of felony offenses, according to the Sentencing Project, a research and advocacy group. The racial disparity is acute: Nationwide, the organization estimates, one in 13 black men cannot vote, a far higher rate than for other groups.”
At The Nation Juan Cole weighs in on the terminology dust-up regarding terrorists-who-claim-to-be-Muslims: “For Baghdadi to call his band of human traffickers, rapists, drug smugglers, and looters the “Islamic State” is rather like a Mexican drug cartel adopting the moniker “the Vatican,” and our adopting that term thereafter (“The Vatican kidnapped 30 people today”) when reporting on its violence. Journalists would resist such linguistic coercion in the case of Catholics; they should resist it in the case of Muslims as well.” Further, adds Cole, “The language of war elevates terrorists to the very status to which they aspire: that of legitimate combatants…The young men recruited by the late petty thief Abdelhamid Abaaoud were, it should go without saying, not soldiers; they were delinquents outfitted with bombs and machine guns instead of stilettos…Abaaoud and his partners in crime deserve no military stripes.”
Arit John of Bloomberg explains “How Snapchat fits into Bernie Sanders’s strategy,” and provides insight into how the platform can be used in political campaigns. “…There is some data to indicate that, while 2016 might not be the Snapchat election, it is, at least, a natural fit for a candidate such as Sanders. Thirty-seven percent of the app’s 100 million daily users are 18- to 24-year-olds, according to the company. After the Aug. 6 Republican debate, Snapchat said 18- to 24-year-olds were more likely to watch the platform’s five-minute “live story” of the debate than watch the debate live on television. Two-thirds of 18- to 34-year-old Snapchat users are likely voters and about a third of all 18- to 34-year-old likely voters use the app, according to an online poll commissioned by Snapchat and conducted by Global Strategy Group and Public Opinion Strategies from Oct. 15-25.”
AP News Wire’s “Democrats planning multi-year strategy to recapture seats” reports on the DNC’s 19-page comeback plan. “Across the nation, Democrats hold 3,172 of the 7,383 seats in state legislatures, or 43 percent. Of the 99 legislative chambers, Democrats only have a majority in 30…The report says the party needs to develop and deploy a “clear, values-based message,” strengthen state parties, protect the right to vote, prepare for redistricting after the 2020 elections and recruit a new generation of leaders.”
Ezra Klein and Alan Abramowitz engage in dialogue at Vox about Nate Silver’s contention that Trump most likely won’t win his party’s nomination. Abramowitz is not so sure, and cites indicators of Trump’s strength: “What I think is different is Republicans are tuned in to a much greater degree than they were at this point in previous nomination contests. You can see that in polling when you ask whether voters are paying attention, and you can see that in ratings for the debates. The idea that voters aren’t tuned in yet and won’t make up their minds till January or later may not prove as true as it has in the past…Because of the higher level of interest and attention this year, these early polls may be more predictive of what’s likely to happen…Trump isn’t only leading in national polling. He’s leading in every state poll I’ve seen. He seems to be ahead in Iowa, in New Hampshire, in South Carolina, Nevada.”
At Salon.com Heather Digby Parton addresses concerns about the term “fascism” being used too loosely in describing Donald Trump, and offers plenty of examples indicating he merits the term. Parton quotes CNN’s M.J. Lee: “”Trump is a fascist. And that’s not a term I use loosely or often. But he’s earned it,” tweeted Max Boot, a conservative fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations who is advising Marco Rubio…”Forced federal registration of US citizens, based on religious identity, is fascism. Period. Nothing else to call it,” Jeb Bush national security adviser John Noonan wrote on Twitter…Conservative Iowa radio host Steve Deace, who has endorsed Ted Cruz, also used the “F” word last week: “If Obama proposed the same religion registry as Trump every conservative in the country would call it what it is — creeping fascism. Parton adds,”…In his book, “Rush, Newspeak and Fascism” David Neiwert explained that the dictionary definition of the word often leaves out the most important characteristics of the philosophy, which are “its claims to represent the “true character” of the respective national identities among which it arises; and its mythic core of national rebirth — not to mention its corporatist component, its anti-liberalism, its glorification of violence and its contempt for weakness.” If that’s not Donald Trump I don’t know what is.”
One shudders to think who will show for this.

Here’s an excerpt from Democrat John Bel Edwards’ inspiring victory statement on winning the Louisiana governorship: “This election shows us that the people of Louisiana in a time of deep cynicism about our politics, and also about our future, that the people have chosen hope over scorn, over negativity,” Edwards told a crowd of supporters at his victory party at the Monteleone Hotel. “I did not create this breeze of hope that’s rolling across our beautiful and blessed state. But I did catch it…”This breeze has its roots in the songs of the Louisiana Hayride, the food of our cajun ancestors, the spirituals of our African-American churches and the faith of our Italian … strawberry farmers, and the energy of Native Americans and our Hispanic immigrants. No I didn’t start the breeze of hope, but I did catch it. And so did you.”
Wish we could say that Edwards’ win is a beachhead for Dems in the South. But, with benefit of hindsight, it’s hard to imagine a more beatable incumbent than Vitter, as The Fix’s Phillip Bump explains — nor a tougher candidate to take him on. Still the 12-point margin of victory is impressive, and Edwards deserves credit for relentlessly pounding Vitter’s scandal and shrewdly coupling it with Vitter’s failure to support veterans. Edwards won’t be sworn in as Governor until January. But don’t be surprised if he makes the short list of potential 2016 running mates.
Here is the “answering the call” ad that has been credited with helping Edwards:
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Perfect storm that it was, the reverberations of Edwards’ victory may indeed help Dems get some traction down the road, as Tim Murphy’s Mother Jones post “Louisiana Just Voted to Give a Quarter of a Million People Health Care” suggests. Matthew Yglesias adds at Vox, “This was the issue on which Edwards positioned himself as an orthodox Democrat and he won. It’s also the issue on which a number of Republican governors in the midwest and southwest have felt the need to compromise.”
The Republicans’ Medicaid expansion blockade is also starting to crumble in Georgia, reports Jim Galloway in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “On Dec. 4, up in the northwest corner of Georgia, Hutcheson Medical Center will close its doors for the last time….The Fort Oglethorpe institution, which once employed 900 and had an annual payroll of $29 million, will be the fifth hospital in Georgia to fail in the last two years. To describe the clientele that the 179-bed facility once served as overwhelmingly Republican is to dabble in understatement. The hospital’s obituary is sure to reignite the debate over whether the state should find a way to come to terms with Obamacare and extend Medicaid coverage to hundreds of thousands of Georgians who lack health insurance…”This greatly hinders the state’s hopes of ever bringing another industrial or IT firm or any other major employer into that area. It really hurts those efforts,” Robinson said. “All those jobs move to Chattanooga, at the closest.””
Already he’s waffling about a third party run, and that’s a good thing…for Dems.
Alec MacGillis’s NYT Sunday Review article “Who Turned My Blue State Red? is generating buzz with his explanation why “Parts of the country that depend on the safety-net programs supported by Democrats are increasingly voting for Republicans who favor shredding that net.” MacGillis presents Pew Research polling data indicating that “likely nonvoters” more often need or receive government assistance than do “likely voters.” Further, argues MacGillis, those who are doing a little better than aid recipients are often quite critical of government benefits and its recipients. But rather than voting against Democrats, it’s more the reality that they have “become profoundly disconnected from the political process” and don’t vote, which has turned some blue states and localities red. MacGilliss’s proposed policy remedies seem like very long-term solutions. Democrats may need to focus more on targeting their GOTV with a little more precision to reach the “profoundly disconnected” nonvoters.
CNN’s Eric Bradner reports that “Republicans split on guns for terror watch list members,” forcing GOP candidates to make a problematic choice: piss off the NRA or voters concerned about national security.
And the most unpopular governor in the U.S. is…

Writing in The Nation, Eric Alterman has a blistering critique of the Republican Party presidential candidates and their operatives in his article, “The Crazier the Republican Candidates Sound, the More Popular They Become.” In one take-no-prisoners excerpt Alterman observes:

… The party is being led by a group of people with politics so extreme and explanations so silly–and often transparently dishonest–that one cannot help but question their sanity. Can Donald Trump really believe that Barack Obama was born in Kenya and that virtually all undocumented immigrants are potential rapists and murderers? Can Ben Carson truly consider Obamacare on a par with slavery? And which answer would be more comforting: shameless liar or lunatic fantasist?
… this same disease has infected the entire Republican field. In the hopes of appealing to angry, ill-informed, and xenophobic primary voters, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush, and Carly Fiorina are all adopting positions that are not only beyond the boundaries of the beliefs of the vast majority of Americans, but also contrary to the laws of physics, economics, and, of course, common sense.

Among the causes of the GOP’s domination of the House of Reps, state legislatures and governorships, Alterman cites the Citizens United decision and gerrymandering. But Alterman doesn’t let Democrats off the hook, either:

The Democrats are also at fault. By failing to present a class-based appeal to Americans besieged by a pitiless global capitalism, they’ve allowed themselves to be defined as elitist snobs who view the everyday struggles of working-class Americans–especially white males–with contempt. At the same time, they have failed to protect vulnerable minorities from the consequences of the rage and fear felt by this class–manifested most obviously in oppressive patterns of policing that victimize people of color, impoverishing their families, weakening their communities, and ensuring their lifelong alienation from mainstream society.

Yet few objective observers would deny that the policies of individual Democratic leaders that affect both white working class and African American voters are substantially more progressive than anything the Republicans propose. In fact, everything Alterman says about Democrats is far more true of Republicans. Yet the image he describes persists.
It may have to do, in part, with expectations — many African Americans and white workers want a stronger voice for reforms that can benefit their lives, and they are not getting it. So the more progressive, but not progressive enough party gets stigmatized as betraying its ideals. For some voters, that is worse than open opposition.
Most Democratic elected officials are far more progressive than their party’s image, which is sort of a tribute to the GOP’s superior message discipline. Even when the message is rooted in lies and distortion, their echo chamber functions efficiently. Democrats are all over the place.
One possible remedy: more Democratic ad campaigns directed at defining the difference between the two parties, instead of just the usual yada-yada from different candidates. Republicans understand “brand identification” a lot better than their opponents. We almost never see that. It’s time Dems got a clue.
Alterman provides an equally-blistering take-down of the false equivalence default position of much of the mainstream media:

Liberals like yours truly spend a lot of time obsessing over Fox News and talk-radio. But no less a significant factor in the success of the irredentists has been the willingness of so many members of the mainstream media to run interference for–and therefore legitimize–the same dangerous nonsense in the guise of allegedly objective reporting. The mainstream media’s coverage of every Republican debate so far has had the effect of subordinating reality to fantasy. Jonathan Martin’s front-page New York Times report on the most recent debate deemed that fib-fest to be a “robust seminar on the issues.” In an article devoted to the lies dominating the election cycle, the Times’s Michael Barbaro could not bring himself to go further than to say that Carson “harshly turned the questions” about inconsistencies in his life story “back on the reporters who asked them,” and that Fiorina “refused” to back down from a story about Planned Parenthood that was “roundly disputed.” And in what read like a parody of the idiotic “both sides do it” meme, Barbaro equated all this with the fact that Hillary Clinton once described herself as being the granddaughter of four immigrants when, in fact, one was born shortly after her family arrived in the United States–something she quickly corrected. Beyond that, he found a few (largely personal) fibs from Democrats who ran for president in the late 1980s and ’90s, as if these were somehow equivalent to the lies that Republican candidates are telling today. (Barbaro also appeared unimpressed with Clinton’s explanations about her e-mail accounts, as though these might qualify as lies.)

A great deal of the reporting Alterman describes is very deliberate. But I get the feeling that a lot of it is simply lazy reporting by writers who fall back on “on-the-one-hand, on-the-other-hand” formulas to cover their asses. It might help if J-schools did more to stress critical thinking. Other than that, calling them out more energetically will have to do.
Dems can hope with some reason that the GOP is headed for disaster in 2016. But counting on it would be foolish and dangerous. What Democrats must do over the next year is shore up their GOTV, because it sure looks like Republicans have done so, and hone a compelling message that distinguishes their party as the best option for voters who are paying attention.

Black Lives Matter is increasing its involvement in electoral politics, reports John Eligon in The New York Times: “Two groups have started political action committees to back candidates who support ideas espoused by Black Lives Matter activists. One, Black Lives Matter Political Action Committee, started by a St. Louis radio host, plans to raise money for voter education in races for law enforcement-related offices, including for district attorney and judgeships. The second, Black Lives Matter Super PAC, was started by New York activists who hope to raise large donations from celebrities to influence campaigns for a variety of offices…”At this point, marching and protesting, it’s not going anywhere,” said Tarik Mohamed, treasurer and a founder of the super PAC. “So we’re trying to find new avenues of engaging people for change.””
At The Upshot Brendan Nyhan explains why “It’s Easy to Overestimate Effect of Paris Attacks on 2016 Race.”
It appears that the Administration has a tough sell ahead regarding bringing more Syrian refugees tot he U.S. At NBCNews.com Allison Kopicki, John Lapinski and Hannah Hartiga report that a “Majority of Americans Oppose Accepting Syrian Refugees.” The authors write, “The latest NBC News/SurveyMonkey online poll shows that 56% of Americans disapprove of allowing more migrants fleeing violence in Syria and other nations into the country, while 41% approve and the issue divides sharply across party lines…About 8 in 10 Republicans disapprove of accepting more Syrian refugees – including 64% who strongly disapprove. Nearly two thirds of Democrats support the president’s policy, while more independents disapprove (59%) than approve (40%).
The New York Times editorial board nonetheless makes a case against the House GOP’s “the American Security Against Foreign Enemies (SAFE) Act of 2015” as “election-year pandering to the xenophobia that rears up when threats from abroad arise.”
William Saletan provides a Slate.com take on the political ramifications of the GOP’s Muslim-bashing.
Unless this poll is an outlier, Democrats have work to do in this swing state.
At Huffiest Pollster Political scientists Keith Gaddie and Kirby Godel chart “The Donkey’s Narrow Path” to victory in the Louisiana governor’s race, which will be decided this Saturday, November 21st. “Analyses of early voting in Louisiana indicate that turnout will likely be higher than in the primary, increasing from 39 percent to 44 percent. And the electorate will be more Democratic and more African-American, according to early voting data, These are ominous signs for David Vitter. Runoff turnout surges are more common in Louisiana, and usually result from increased black voter participation in the second round. The Louisiana Troopers Association endorsement of John Bel Edwards likely solidified the frontrunner’s level of support among whites — which has run between 34 percent and 38 percent across public polls and in private tracking polls…For Democrats in running deep red states, there is a lesson here. Republican divisions may create opportunities for victories, but the path is narrow requiring both a flawed Republican nominee and a divided GOP.” The authors also credit Edwards messaging, citing his “military experience, pro-life identity, and moderate politics out in stark contrast to Vitter’s known associations.”
Karen Bruggeman provides additional analysis in National Journal’s “Democrats Stunned They Could Win Louisiana Governor’s Race.”
Democrats interested in media outlets to reach the white working-class with ads should check out Ken Tucker’s Yahoo post, “‘The Middle’ Is TV’s Top Working-Class Comedy.”

How Will the terrorist attacks in France affect U.S. politics? It seems logical that Ben Carson might get a bump, if it is only temporary, since he seems to be riding a crest of Islamophobia. But I’ll be surprised if the other Republican candidates don’t try to top Carson’s fear-mongering. Watch what happens with Marine Le Pen’s campaign to be elected President of France. Trump and the neocons will be monitoring her tone for tips about xenophobic pandering.
“In Presidential Campaign, It’s Now Terrorism, Not Taxes,” as the lead issue of the 2016 campaign, writes Jonathan Martin at The New York Times. Further, says Martin: “Much is not known about the attack’s impact on the race, given short attention spans in politics and the news media and the fact that it did not occur on American soil…” However, notes martin, “Further, the scale of the assault, its direct link to the Islamic State and the fact that one of the attackers appeared to have been a Syrian refugee who came to Europe through Greece is also pushing the Republican candidates to speak more loudly about keeping Middle Eastern migrants out of the United States.”
At The Washington Post Jenna Johnson reports on what the candidates are saying about bringing Syrian refuges into the U.S. Johnson reports that some Republicans are advocating more liberal immigration policies toward Christian refugees, and further “Lavinia Limon, the president and chief executive of the U.S. Commission for Refugees and Immigrants, said she is surprised that the once-nonpartisan cause of helping refugees fleeing violence has become so politicized. She noted that it takes about three years for refugees to go through stringent security screenings — a process that she doubts terrorists would wait through when there are other ways to get into the United States.”
Republican Governors Robert J. Bentley of Alabama and Rick Snyder of Michigan are now refusing Syrian refugees, according to Rick Rojas, reporting in the New York Times.
In the Democratic presidential debate on Saturday, Former Secretary of State Clinton and former Maryland Governor O’Malley stressed the importance of coalition intervention against ISIS. O’Malley also emphasized he need for Americans to stand by their Muslim neighbors in the U.S., who may experience unjust treatment in the wake of the Paris atrocities. Sen. Bernie Sanders differentiates his views on the U.S. “regime change” from those of his fellow presidential candidates: “”These toppling of governments, regime changes have unintended consequences,” he said. “On this issue I’m a little bit more conservative than the secretary and I am not a great fan of regime change.”
“The Associated Press contacted all 712 superdelegates to the Democratic National Convention next summer, and asked them which Republican they thought would be their party’s strongest opponent in the general election…Of the 176 superdelegates who answered the question, 65 said Rubio, the first-term senator from Florida, would be the Democrats’ strongest opponent.” After Rubio, the delegates said Kasich and Bush would be the next strongest opponents for the Democratic nominee.
“GOP Candidates Suck Up to Hatemongers: Ted Cruz, Bobby Jindal, and Mike Huckabee fete a man who thinks the Bible says we should execute gays,” writes David Boaz at The Daily Beast.
Sena McElwee explains why “Higher voter turnout could limit the far right” at Aljazeera America, and notes that data indicate that “Liberal Republicans” are the least likely self-identified group on the political spectrum to cast ballots. He concludes from his analysis of the data that “Increased voter turnout would bring more moderate, center-right and left-leaning voters into the electorate…Policies such as automatic voter registration, which would work to bolster turnout, could therefore reduce polarization and make our politics more representative of the popular will.”
Harold Meyerson addresses an important political topic that merits a lot more attention in his post “Why America Needs Another Trust-Busting Movement” at The American Prospect.

It looks like the GOP has a new poster-boy for voter suppression, even though he was demoted to the ‘kiddie table.’ This despite the fact that “New Jersey currently ranks 39th in the country in both percentage of eligible voters who are registered and percentage of voters who actually cast a ballot” and the fact that the “2015 elections likely saw lowest voter turnout in N.J. history.”
Regarding the abysmal voter turnout in Kentucky’s gubernatorial election, Benjamin Knoll writes at Kentucky.com: “One clear option is Election-Day registration (EDR) where voters can show up and register on the spot before going into vote. Studies have shown that it boosts turnout by anywhere from three to four percent. There is very little downside and 11 states plus the District of Columbia have already implemented it…Another option would be to extend poll closing times past 6 p.m. After all, Kentucky has one of the earliest poll closing times in the entire United States. One piece of research by three political scientists at the University of California found that states with poll closing times after 7 p.m. have about a three percent higher turnout rate than those that close before 7 p.m…Perhaps the most effective option would be to consolidate state and federal election cycles in Kentucky, a practice currently done by 45 other states (only Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Jersey and Virginia hold state-level officer elections in odd-numbered years).”
Duke University Political Scientists John B. Holbein and D. Sunshine Hillygus present evidence in the American Journal of Political Science that preregistration of 17-year old voters increases youth voter turnout.
As reported in The Connection, an Arlington, VA-based newspaper, here’s a voter turnout template which may merit replication: “The turnout drive by VOICE (Virginians Organized for Interfaith Community Engagement), a multi-faith citizens power organization, cited a 24 percent increase in voter turnout in Precinct 30 (Nauck neighborhood) from the November 2011 election — the last off-year election with a comparable ballot. It also led to a 12 percent increase in turnout in Precinct 43 (Arlington Mill neighborhood), VOICE leaders said…The voter turnout campaign targeted primarily infrequent voters, enlisting more than 100 volunteers to knock on doors, talk to voters at bus stops, and call voters Nov. 1-3. The aim was to raise turnout by at least 5 percent from November 2011 in these two precincts…Noting that VOICE exceeded its goal almost five-fold in Precinct 30 and more than doubled it in Precinct 43, the Rev. Dr. James E. Victor, Jr., of Mount Olive Baptist Church said, “We learned that, when you make the effort to truly engage people around their hopes and dreams, Arlington’s residents will respond and vote.”
National Journal’s Josh Kraushaar argues that “Donald Trump’s Huge Debate Blunder: By embracing lower wages, Trump risks losing some support from his rock-solid working-class base.”
A few final thoughts regarding the GOP’s last presidential debate: Tony Monkovic reports some bad news for Rubio at The Upshot that “Of the 12 general election winners in the last 100 years who weren’t already president, every Republican was older than the oldest Democrat.” And, I hope Democratic ad makers are doing a good job of compiling Trump’s bully-boy rants, a rich motherlode for Democratic ads, should he get the GOP nomination. Best quote about the GOP debate came from E. J. Dionne, Jr.: “The GOP hopefuls often sounded as if they were addressing a convention of Mercedes owners.”
Kyle Kondik, Managing Editor, Sabato’s Crystal Ball explains their “Ratings Change: Louisiana Gubernatorial Race Now a Toss-Up.”
Sanders scores “landslide margins” iover Trump, Bush in McClatchy-Marist poll, reports Brent Budowski at The Hill. “Sanders has a lead over Trump that could be so huge that he would win a landslide victory in the presidential campaign, with margins that would almost certainly lead Democrats to regain control of the Senate and could help Democrats regain control of the House of Representatives…”
A chuckle from The Onion.

At this juncture I would tend to agree with MSNBC’s Nicole Brown that, rightly or wrongly, “Rubio is the GOPer Democrats fear most…” Tuesday’s debate did nothing to diminish his stature, relative to his admittedly mediocre competition. Ed Kilgore notes at the Washington Monthly, “Marco Rubio was the “winner” according to most Republican assessments (e.g., Politico’s “Caucus” of early-state GOP insiders), partly on style points and partly because he got in the most telling shots at Rand Paul’s heterodoxies on national security.”
James Hohman notes at The Washington Post, “The critical reviews of the Florida senator’s performance are positive across the board, with some dissenters saying he sounded too canned.” Hohman rounds up some other pundits on Rubio’s performance in Milwaukee:

The Fix’s Chris Cillizza: “Rubio knocked it out of the park when debating military spending and the right role for America in the world with Rand Paul. He got a meatball of a question when asked by the moderators about Hillary Clinton’s résumé as compared with his own; he, unsurprisingly, answered it well and easily. Time and time again, he oozed knowledge while appearing entirely relaxed.”
Conservative Post columnist Jennifer Rubin: “Rubio once again had the strongest performance. He shot down Paul’s suggestion that spending on the military makes one ‘liberal’ and repeatedly spoke up in favor of strong U.S. leadership. … Asked about running against an experienced Clinton, he went into his effective riff about representing the future while she represents the past.”
The New York Times’ Jonathan Martin and Patrick Healy: “Rubio was not only able to avoid being drawn into the contentious immigration debate, but also repeatedly received questions that allowed him to answer with versions of his stump speech. Even he seemed unable to believe his good fortune when he was asked to make his case against Clinton. He chuckled for a moment before unspooling a well-rehearsed argument: why he can prosecute a ‘generational’ case against her.”

Rubio does show sporadic flashes of passion and eloquence in presenting his conservative arguments, even though most Democrats probably still visualize him clumsily grasping for a glass of water with shifty eyes. And, as Brown quotes former Obama administration White House communications director, Dan Preiffer, “Rubio is also the most broadly appealing GOP candidate and would have the best shot to close the non-white vote gap with the Democrats.”
Rubio has been hovering around third place, behind Carson and Trump in the most recent polls. Trump drew some boos, or at least groans, from the debate audience last night. It may be that his bully-boy act is beginning to wear thin. Looks to me like Carson is not going to wear well either, when we get to the primaries. He needs a more substantial menu of policies, despite having the least annoying persona of the GOP field.
Democrats will have plenty of material to face down Rubio, if he gets the nomination. As the U.S. Senator with the worst attendance record, Rubio has been able to dodge a lot of criticism by laying relatively low on the most contentious issues for Republicans. Those days are now over. His GOP adversaries will be coming for him in a big way from now on.