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Trump Exhaustion: There's a Cure for It

The daily tantrums. The hourly insults. The several thousand lies, fabrications, and misstatements. The muddying of crystal clear waters.

Living with Trump is like the constant itching need to tweezer out the tick before the tick gets to your bloodstream.

It's all so exhausting. Not just to us Twitterman-averse types but to his supporters too.

Exhausting was the word Sean Spicer used. Working for Trump wore him down, the way a nurse in the trauma ward is worn down. Cal Thomas noticed that Fox News host Neil Cavuto sounded more tired than mad when he addressed an on-air editorial to Trump personally: Payoffs to porn stars? Really, Dude? You've been denying any affair, and the $130,000 (at least) that sloshed over it --“You promised to drain the swamp, but you are muddying the waters."

"Mr. Trump should worry that Americans will stop believing anything he says.” --Cal Thomas. 

Isn't disbelief plain evidence of exhaustion? Or is it the cause?

Outrage maintained at high dynes for extended periods of time can lead to exhaustion. Exhaustion leads to shrugging the shoulders and rolling the eyes at the most recent outrage. The Onion can't even parody what is already the greatest living parody ever in the history of The Presidency.

"We’re exhausted. Trump has exhausted us to the point that he can rip up documents that belong to us — rip up our history and our ability to have a full accounting of what went on here — and all we can do is shrug." Elie Mystal was talking about the actual, literal Trump habit of tearing up all paper that comes across his desk, but it could be the metaphor for Trump's shredding of the emoluments clause. See, you're too exhausted to even notice any more.

Exhausting to the point of numbness. Are we becoming a Nation of Numbnuts? 

Not on your life, Bucko.

Lack of energy -- exhaustion -- can also follow a lack of motivation. Got no plan. Got no energy. That's a bad hole to fall into politically, but it isn't the trap this year. 2018 is full of energy, motivation, and A Plan, and it all climaxes in a vote.

Beto O'Rourke, Ballsy and Punk

So one of 2018's rock stars, Beto O'Rourke, has pulled even to Ted Cruz in polling for the Texas Senate race. Pulled even. He had proposed six debates to Ted Cruz, and Cruz countered with five and demanded the first one be this coming Friday at a place of Cruz's choosing and with a moderator of Cruz's choosing, and Beto said, "Whoa, Big Boy," and refused to jump to Cruz's tune:

O’Rourke said Monday that Cruz’s campaign has “attempted to dictate” different aspects of the debate schedule, such as the time, the moderators and which subjects the candidates could speak about.

“We’re working through those differences, and we’re trying to introduce more of a collaborative style to the negotiations than he [Cruz] may be used to,” O’Rourke said .... “And so we’re confident that out of that, we’re going to come to something good.”

That took balls.

So what did those miffed boys over in Cruz-land do? They dug up an old photo of Beto when he was

Beto O'Rourke, rock star.
He's on the left in goatee
and ponytail

in college and in a punk rock band, and they tweeted it out with the sarcastic suggestion that Beto couldn't debate this Friday because of a previous engagement [wink wink], because they thought that photo would embarrass him and hurt him with Texas Marlboro men.

Well that backfired. 

It's fascinating to watch misfire after misfire by the Trumpian troops, miscalculations that can be deadly. Remember the video ad in favor of Jonathan Jordan that attacked weatherman Ray Russell as the "nutty professor." That one also backfired in a big way. People so mad they're contributing to Russell's campaign.

May the gods of tone-deafness continue to smile on this bunch and continue to inspire their dreams.

By Their Works ... We Shall Know Them

Indebted to the fine folks at Real Facts NC for compiling this list of 19 laws enacted by the NC General Assembly (Berger/Moore), subsequently ruled unlawful by the courts.

So ... an issue of legitimacy and hence illegitimacy. If you drew your own district illegally -- twice now --  and were "safe" via unconstitutional gerrymandering -- then you're illegitimate, and bastards do what bastards are:

Case/Short Name	Bill Number	Passage Date	Struck Down By
Congressional Districts		2011	US Supreme Court as unconstitutional racial gerrymanders
Congressional Districts		2016	Federal panels as unconstitutional partisan gerrymanders in January 2018 and August 2018
Legislative Districts		2011	US Supreme Court as unconstitutional racial gerrymanders
Election/Ethics Board Reform	S4	2016	Three-judge Superior Court Panel; ruling upheld by State Supreme Court
Elections/Ethics Board Reforms	H90	2017	Three-judge panel struck down portion dealing with appointment process
Voter ID	H589	2013	Fourth Circuit (7/16); affirmed by US Supreme Court
Coal Ash Commission	S786/S729	2016	State Supreme Court
Judicial Retention Elections	H222	2015	Struck down by three-judge superior court panel, Supreme Court split 3-3, leaving in place lower court ruling
Stopped NCAE Dues check off	S727	2012	Superior Court Judge 12/12
Career status for teachers	S402	2013	State Supreme Court
Wake County Board of Education	S325	2013	Fourth Circuit (7/16)
Wake County Commissioners Redistricting	S181	2015	Fourth Circuit (7/16)
Greensboro City Council Redistricting	H263	2015	Federal Middle District (4/17)
Women’s Right to Know Act	H854	2011	Fourth Circuit 12/2015
Planned Parenthood defunding	Budget	2011	Federal Middle District
Asheville Water	H488	2013	State Supreme Court
Forced Annexation	S27/H56/H845	2011	Wake County Judge 2012
Ballot Labels for Judicial Elections	S3	2018	NC Court of Appeals
Sore Loser Law	S486	2018	US District Court Judge

Berger/Moore, Reaping What They've Sown

"Sizzling frustration." That's the hot turn of phrase that Sam Levine used to describe the attitude of the three federal judges who issued the 300+ page ruling about the NC General Assembly's continued attempts to keep the state's congressional districts gerrymandered using unconstitutional maps. Well, really it was one of the three, Federal Judge James Wynn, who wrote that decision and showed his mounting anger at our power-blind General Assembly.

Just look at how the Berger/Moore forces have resisted previous court findings: The Republicans passed new congressional district maps in 2011, which were in effect in 2012 and 2014 but were ruled an "unconstitutional racial gerrymander" in 2015. The maps the GA drew in response to that were the maps struck down this week on Monday. In addition to engineering (now) purely partisan gerrymandering to replace their purely racial gerrymandering, the GA has also mucked around in the state's judiciary,  imposing partisanship on those races and eliminating primaries, all in an effort to keep Republican judges on the bench and elect more of them. (And I haven't even gotten to the dismantling of checks and balances that those same Republicans have written into some constitutional amendments, and that's another whole set of lawsuits.)

The Federal judges saw all of that and were not amused. Which is why they're perfectly willing, given Republican behavior, to impose the harshest of remedies, to force the GA (or more likely, a special master) to draw new districts right now.

Berger/Moore, you brought this on yourselves.

Fruit Baskets, TURN OVER!

The whole world appears to be watching now -- the Berger/Moore North Carolina General Assembly (NCGA) once again in national news for unconstitutionally cementing its grip on power via gerrymandering the living hell out of their ideological opponents.

The three-judge panel of Federal judges not only threw out the most recent NCGA redistricting of US House seats. They also said that the Republican scissoring of the state may necessitate another redistricting -- this time by a "special master" who isn't accepting back scratches from anybody -- and maybe even prior to November's scheduled election.

The Background

Berger/Moore

These are the same three Federal judges who heard this case (brought by Common Cause and the League of Women Voters) back in 2017. They issued their unanimous decision on January 9 of this year: That North Carolina’s 2016 redistricting plan (drawn in response to having their first redistricting map thrown out as an unconstitutional racial gerrymander) now relied too heavily on partisan affiliation in drawing constituencies, violating citizens’ rights under the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, the First Amendment, and Article I of the Constitution.

The first time a federal court had ever struck down a redistricting plan as a partisan gerrymander.

Well, the Supreme Court came to the rescue. By January 19 -- ten days later -- the High Court stayed the three-judge panel's order that new maps be drawn forthwith and sent the case back to the three, to reconsider, using the Supremes own very recently written guidelines for who has legal standing in gerrymandering cases. (Without the right to sue -- "standing" -- you're not going anywhere, O my brethren.)

It took over 300 pages of evidence and legal reasoning for the three to say, well, yes, these plaintiffs have standing because they can demonstrate direct harm, and as a matter of fact there is unconstitutional partisan gerrymandering going on in North Carolina, and it's even more pernicious than we thought. Therefore, the NCGA -- no, better, a special master -- needs to redraw those maps, and they may need to do it before this November. But here's our out: we'll give both sides until August 31st to present arguments on whether the court should allow the existing map to be used one more time. (Everyone breathes a sigh of relief. Not using the current maps for this November would probably necessitate turning November 6th into a primary for the 13 US Congressional seats, and move the final election for those seats to January of 2019, just before the convening of the new Congress. The judges even suggested that the state could forego congressional primaries altogether, as the NCGA had shown a willingness to eliminate primaries in other partisan races, namely judgeships.) [judges' mike drop]

The Supreme Court will never let them do it, stop the November election for congresspersons over partisan gerrymandering. The court has never ruled a partisan gerrymander unconstitutional. It blatantly passed up three separate opportunities to do so in its last term (Michael Wines and Richard Fausset). That was with Anthony Kennedy still on the Court.

With Kennedy retired, deadlock could happen, between four justices who have argued that the Court has the ability to judge partisan maps for their infringement on constitutional rights, and four conservatives who've never seen a partisan gerrymander they couldn't wink at. If they deadlocked 4-4, then my understanding is that the three-judge panel would have the magic wand to do its worst.

Some (many? all?) of the current Democratic candidates for US House seats will be relieved when the Supreme Court slaps a stay on this decision, or the three-judge panel stays its own ruling and keeps the old gerrymandered maps for one more time. The only thing worse than dread is dread from multiple directions.

The Rewritten Constitutional Amendment Governing the State Board of Elections Is Still Very Bad

So Berger/Moore have taken out the language that would have stripped the governor of his power to appoint hundreds thousands of members of all state boards and commissions, which are charged with carrying out laws, setting policies, and enforcing compliance. But they left in the baseline chuckleheaded proposal to make the State Board of Elections an even-steven board of four hardline Republicans and four hardline Democrats.

Can you spell stalemate?

The current board is nine members, after the Berger/Moore General Assembly lost another court battle. They let the governor appoint the ninth member, and they've been unhappy ever since. Berger/Moore do not want majority decisions on this particular board, because with stalemate over competitive early voting plans, local boards of elections will have to revert to early voting in the local BOE offices only. It's a ploy, once again, to reduce the influence of early voting on the elections in North Carolina. Among other outcomes. A State Board that deadlocks 4-4 means that local board decisions, no matter how repressive, will stand. Or it will mean that a deadlocked local board will be deadlocked for eternity, as the State Board also deadlocks.

Republicans kind of like government that doesn't work.

Watauga BOE. The two Republican members on the left

Look at the local Watauga Board of Elections, divided 2-2 equally between Dems and Repubs. Nothing can change for the better. For a perfect recent example, the proposal to split the very large New River 3 precinct into two precincts with the in-town voters voting at the National Guard Armory and the out-in-the-country voters voting at Mt. Pleasant Baptist Church ... Republican member Eric Eller first said it was a logical and excellent solution to a persistent problem for in-town voters. Then when the proposal could have passed, he balked. (Board Chair Republican Nancy Owen was never in favor of splitting the precinct. She hates the very idea of "convenience" for the voters. Or at least she said she hated people asking for "convenience" at the polls. It's like unprotected sex.)

Impasse. What could help voters get easier ballot access won't happen, and what we see on the local level could become the law of the realm, if the Republicans get this constitutional amendment through.

Door-Knocking: The Rarest and the Bestest

Read a statistic from the Pennsylvania State Department: Voters in the Keystone State who are 34 and younger now outnumber those 65 and older. 

Happening also in other states besides Pennsylvania. According to Dan Levin, Arizona, New York, Florida, and Virginia "have also seen sharp increases" in voter registration among the under-34 demographic. High time and overdue. 

What about North Carolina?

Those kinds of specific demographic numbers haven't immediately presented themselves. (This was one relevant statistic two years ago, in September 2016: "Only 67% of voting-eligible Millennials and 73% of Gen Xers were active, registered voters, compared to 81% of Boomers and 82% of Silent/Greatest voting-eligibles" -- Dr. Michael Bitzer.) But I don't find statistics for total numbers of Millennials and (especially) the rising number of Gen Zers (those born after 1998), as a percentage of total registration. What's the situation going to be in September 2018? Is that percentage of Millennials and Gen Zers rising?

Voter canvass, Saturday, August 25

I think it is, but I have only anecdotal evidence. I follow many Twitter accounts that show young activists campaigning, canvassing neighborhoods, registering voters, talking knowledgeably about issues that grab them. Break the Majority, an NCDP special campaign arm targeting NC House and Senate seats, launched a statewide canvass yesterday, aiming to knock 24,000 doors by 6 p.m. in targeted districts. Many or most of those canvassers are under the age of 25.

They're informed voters. They know what's been going on and not via Fox News. In fact, not really via any TV. Many -- most? -- of the Millennials I've met recently are readers, like ... reading is back, y'all! Which means, maybe, some young brains have better bullshit detectors.

Lipstick on the Pig

So another special session of the NC General Assembly today. Because all the other special sessions worked so well?

The NC House convenes this a.m. at 10 to rewrite (?) the two constitutional amendments that a three-judge panel ruled were impermissibly deceptive. They'll pass something today, probably, and the NC Senate will convene Monday to vote on what the House does.

Even if they're more honest about what those two amendments would do, the amendments will still be appalling usurpations of power to make Berger/Moore the dictators.