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Bernie Sanders Is Gaining on Hillary Clinton in Her Own Backyard

by AmadoHahnexwwo Posted on March 31, 2016

Mother Jones

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Bernie Sanders won his home state of Vermont with a whopping 86 percent of the vote. Hillary Clinton, it seems, will have no such luck on her home turf.

Sanders is slowly gaining on Clinton in New York ahead of the April 19 primary. Clinton now leads Sanders by 12 points in New York’s Democratic primary, according to a Quinnipiac Poll released Thursday. A poll in February showed Sanders 21 points behind Clinton in New York, and another in March showed him 48 points behind.

Sanders’ growing support in New York is not altogether surprising. Born and raised in Brooklyn, the Vermont senator can also claim ties to the state. More important, the political climate in New York is favorable to Sanders. Areas of western New York resemble demographically the Midwestern states where Sanders has performed relatively well. And there is a blueprint for a progressive challenger in New York. In 2014, a law professor with no name recognition and little money or organization, Zephyr Teachout, won a third of the vote in her primary challenge to the state’s incumbent Democratic governor, Andrew Cuomo. Unlike Teachout, Sanders has plenty of money, name recognition, and a growing organization in the state.

Still, with Sanders trailing in the delegate count, he’ll need to start racking up meaningful wins—not just close contests—in delegate-rich states like New York in order to catch up to Clinton.

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Bernie Sanders Is Gaining on Hillary Clinton in Her Own Backyard

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What the NFL’s concussion scandal has in common with tobacco and ExxonMobil

by Octavia1778 Posted on March 24, 2016

What the NFL’s concussion scandal has in common with tobacco and ExxonMobil

By on 24 Mar 2016commentsShare

A New York Times investigation published Thursday confirms that the National Football League’s research on player concussions was seriously flawed, undercounting diagnoses by more than 10 percent in a series of studies from 1996 to 2001. At the same time, the league appeared to engage in a systematic campaign of obfuscation and denial. Even now that the the NFL’s top health official has admitted that football and degenerative brain disorders are “certainly” linked, some NFL fans and stakeholders remain unconvinced — publicly, at least. Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, for instance, said this week that “there’s no data that in any way creates a knowledge” — in other words, the jury’s still out.

If this sounds familiar, it’s because the NFL’s techniques are like those employed for decades by Big Tobacco to confuse consumers over the scientific research on smoking. In fact, the Times reports, the NFL hired tobacco lawyers, advisors, and lobbyists to help them do exactly that. In the 1990s, for instance, the league employed Dorothy Mitchell, an attorney who had also represented the Tobacco Institute in lawsuits over the health effects of cigarettes and secondhand smoke.

All this sounds remarkably like another industry that we now know borrowed tactics from Big Tobacco: oil and gas. In 1996, as the world considered acting to curtail fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, then-Exxon CEO Lee Raymond said, “Scientific evidence remains inconclusive as to whether human activities affect the global climate,” adding that “scientists agree there’s ample time to better understand climate systems and consider policy options, so there’s simply no reason to take drastic action now.”

The idea that “evolving science” means there’s no need to act is still prevalent among polluters and their political allies. “It is not unanimous among scientists that [climate change] is disproportionately manmade,” one-time presidential candidate Jeb Bush said last year. Last year, investigations by InsideClimate News, the Los Angeles Times, and Columbia University uncovered how Exxon-Mobil and the American Petroleum Institute were at the cutting edge of climate change research in the 1970s, until they reversed course to create a culture of denial we know too well today.

Big Oil, like the tobacco industry in the 1950s and perhaps now the NFL since the 1990s, knew of a major problem long before it admitted to it publicly. And like the health of smokers and football players, our health and the planet’s has suffered for it.

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What the NFL’s concussion scandal has in common with tobacco and ExxonMobil

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Trump endorsed by Florida’s climate-denying governor

by FaeSharwood479 Posted on March 16, 2016

Trump endorsed by Florida’s climate-denying governor

By on 16 Mar 2016commentsShare

Republicans of the internet, Florida Gov. Rick Scott has a message for you, posted on the official Rick Scott™ Facebook™ page: Embrace Donald Trump.

Not only is Scott jumping on the Trump wagon, he even compares himself to the man. “When I first ran for Governor the political class and party leaders opposed me with great vigor, and some even said if I won the primary they would never vote for me,” he writes. “But the voters had other ideas, and they are the only ones who count.”

And we can see the resemblance. Sure, one has bird feathers for hair and the other is bald as a baby’s asshole, but both have been accused of fraud for shady dealings in the business world: Trump for his “university,” and Scott for overseeing one of the largest boondoggles in Medicare history.

Plus, both the future presidential nominee and the current governor are climate change deniers. Trump has repeatedly said that climate change is a hoax created by the Chinese to undercut the United States in manufacturing; Scott’s administration banned state officials from mentioning climate change in official reports. In Florida. It’s a match made in denier heaven.

Congratulations to Mr. Trump on the endorsement. Congratulations to Mr. Scott on finding a buyer for his soul.

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Bush Brother Joins Ted Cruz’s Finance Team

by YolandaFoust Posted on March 8, 2016

Mother Jones

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While the political world speculates on whether Jeb Bush will endorse his onetime protege Marco Rubio ahead of the Florida primary, another Bush brother has thrown his support to Rubio’s rival, Ted Cruz. According to the Cruz campaign, Neil Bush, Jeb and George W.’s younger brother, has signed on as member of its national finance team.

Neil has a colorful business background, dating back to his role in the spectacular collapse of the Silverado Savings and Loan in 1988. Bush, who served on the bank’s board of directors, was singled out by regulators for engaging “in unsafe and unsound practices involving multiple conflicts of interest,” according to an administrative law judge (who nonetheless recommended mild disciplinary action against the Bush brother). Neil, who denied any wrongdoing, allegedly failed to mention to other board members that two of the bank’s biggest borrowers were also his business associates. Bush’s partners ultimately defaulted on more than $100 million in loans, helping to sink the bank, whose implosion cost taxpayers more than $1.3 billion. Bush and the other directors of the bank were later personally sued for “gross negligence” by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation; he settled his portion of the case for $50,000.

Here’s a quick summary of Bush’s alleged involvement:

At the center of the allegations against Bush were his relationships with two Colorado developers, Bill L. Walters and Kenneth M. Good. The two developers ultimately defaulted on more than $100 million in loans from Silverado, which helped bring about its collapse, according to regulators.

The regulators charged that Neil Bush failed to disclose adequately to his fellow directors that he had extensive business dealings with the developers at a time that they were receiving loans from Silverado.

According to the charges, Neil Bush violated his duties by voting to approve loans to Walters without disclosing the extent of his business deals with Walters and he personally arranged for Walters to receive a $900,000 line of credit from Silverado.

The regulators also accused Bush of failing to tell his fellow directors that Good was preparing to invest $3 million in Bush’s oil drilling firm at a time Good told Silverado he was broke and could not make his loan payments. Good also loaned Bush $100,000 that was never repaid.

While Cruz has won Neil Bush’s backing, his brother George, whose 2000 campaign Cruz worked for, doesn’t seem likely to throw his support to the Texas senator. “I just don’t like that guy,” he told donors last year.

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Bush Brother Joins Ted Cruz’s Finance Team

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Three Numbers That Explain the Modern Political Ecosystem

by Rodger31Y3 Posted on March 4, 2016

Mother Jones

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If you want to understand how politicians manipulate today’s media environment, there are only three numbers you need to know:

Detroit debate viewership (TV plus streaming): 20 million
Daytime cable news viewership: 1-2 million
Print newspaper viewership: 1 million max

The last number is a guesstimate for the number of people who will see Donald Trump’s statement announcing that he’s had a change of heart about ordering the US military to torture prisoners. If anything, it’s generous. A printed statement just isn’t going to make the rounds much. Nor is it going to be a big deal on social media, especially among the Trump demographic.

So here’s what you get:

When Bret Baier asks Trump what would happen if the military refuses his order to torture prisoners, 20 million people hear and see him say, “They won’t refuse….I’ve never had any problem leading people. If I say do it, they’re going to do it.”
The next day, 2-3 million people read (or hear a network anchor recite) a bloodless statement that says, “I do, however, understand that the United States is bound by laws and treaties and I will not order our military or other officials to violate those laws and will seek their advice on such matters.”

The arithmetic here is pretty simple. There are at least 17 million people who hear Trump insist that he’s going to torture “these animals over in the Middle East” and never see the retraction. For Trump, this is a double win. His base continues to think he’s a tough guy. Elites breathe a small sigh of relief and figure that maybe this means Trump will calm down and listen to his advisors if he wins the presidency.

The exact numbers can vary, but the basic math plays out the same way all the time. Politicians have learned that they can lie without consequence. They tell the lie on television, where lots of people see it, and then count on virtually nobody seeing the earnest fact checks the next day.

Among younger voters, you probably have to factor in social media as well. But you also have to factor in the well-known evidence that fact checks rarely change anyone’s mind. Welcome to 21st century America.

UPDATE: There’s another piece of this that’s worth mentioning. Trump’s retraction was given to the Wall Street Journal, so naturally they’re playing it big on their front page. But I just checked USA Today, Fox, MSNBC, the LA Times, the New York Times, and the Washington Post, and none of them have so much as mentioned this on their home pages. This is not a coincidence. They hate having to acknowledge a competitor, and that causes them to downplay the news.

The one exception is CNN, which has plastered it at the top of their home page and mentioned it repeatedly on air. I don’t quite know why they’re the exception.

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Three Numbers That Explain the Modern Political Ecosystem

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John Kasich Is Banking on a Contested Convention

by TamelaDennys Posted on March 4, 2016

Mother Jones

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Ohio Gov. John Kasich doesn’t have much hope of racking up enough delegates to be elected the Republican presidential nominee by the party’s convention in Cleveland this summer. So far he’s only secured 25 delegates, per the New York Times, far behind Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, let alone front-runner Donald Trump.

But during an appearance at the Conservative Political Action Conference outside Washington, DC, on Friday afternoon, Kasich remained optimistic that he could become his party’s nominee—by winning a contested convention. “I don’t think anyone’s going to get that,” Kasich said when Fox News’ Sean Hannity asked him about the prospects for any candidate to gain enough delegates to win the nomination on a first-ballot vote. “Could you think of anything cooler than a contested convention?” Kasich said, adding that it would make for a fun civics lesson for viewers at home.

Before he sat down with Hannity, Kasich roamed the CPAC stage solo, speaking to the crowd. He kicked off his speech with remembrances of how, as a young man in 1976, he worked to force a contested convention in order to put Ronald Reagan forward as the Republican nominee over incumbent President Gerald Ford. (Ford won the nomination but lost the presidency.) “The fact is, we got him on the ballot, and I was at the convention with Gov. Reagan, and I had at a very young age found myself in charge of five states for Gov. Reagan,” Kasich said.

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John Kasich Is Banking on a Contested Convention

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At Conservative Gathering, Attacks on Donald Trump Are Not Sticking

by euro9 Posted on March 4, 2016

Mother Jones

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Increasingly desperate in the face of Donald Trump’s growing lead in the Republican primary contest, his opponents have begun hurling attacks at him in a last-ditch effort to stop his rise. Marco Rubio is now calling Trump a “con artist” who started a “fake university” in order to trick people into taking out loans. Ted Cruz continues to hammer at Trump for having previously been pro-choice and progressive on other issues before he decided to run for president. Mitt Romney lashed out at him on Thursday as “a phony, a fraud.” A new super-PAC dedicated to defeating Trump released an ad this week hitting the front-runner for the Trump University scam.

But attendees of this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference, just outside Washington, DC, say these attacks are one scam they are not going to fall for.

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At Conservative Gathering, Attacks on Donald Trump Are Not Sticking

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One-Man Protest Tries to Sway Conservatives From Trump’s Divisiveness

by QuinnHartley38 Posted on March 3, 2016

Mother Jones

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Most of the attendees of this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference aren’t too worried about Donald Trump’s divisive views on race, as my colleague Pema Levy noted earlier today. But one conference-goer is staging a one-man protest against Trump for undoing the Republican Party’s progress on inclusiveness with his attacks on immigrants and hesitance to distance himself from a former leader of the Ku Klux Klan.

Brian Hawkins stood outside the press check-in booth on Thursday with a homemade sign proclaiming “Veterans Against Trump.” Hawkins is no liberal—he moved to Virginia to work in conservative policy after finishing his Army service last year, and his sign bore stickers declaring “Big Government Sucks” and “I Heart Capitalism”—but he is fully onboard the anyone-but-Trump train, which picked up an adamant Mitt Romney in Utah on Thursday. “As long as Donald Trump continues to speak a message of divisiveness and hatred of others,” Hawkins told me, “he’s not consistent with limited government, free market, and individual liberty principles of conservatism.”

Hawkins is African American and is particularly upset about the way Trump has helped foster the image that that Republican Party relies on racism to appeal to voters. “As a black Republican, I spend my entire adult life defending the Republican Party against charges of racism,” Hawkins said. “And I’m like, ‘Noooo, it doesn’t exist, maybe there’s a few idiots out there but they don’t represent conservative values.’ And then this happens. Completely nativist and cynical viewpoints. I don’t believe that a lot of these voters are racist, but I’m not sure what the appeal is to Trump. But whatever it is, we need to come to our senses, because this man could be president.”

The CPAC crowd has generally been open—or at least outwardly friendly—to his message, Hawkins said. “With this crowd, you get a lot more of the ideological conservatives, who understand that Trump does not represent our values,” he said. Hawkins is now a Rubio supporter after his preferred candidate, Rand Paul, dropped out. But he’s mainly concerned with making sure Trump doesn’t become the nominee.

“I can’t believe that in 2016 that the legitimacy of the KKK is part of our political discussion,” he said. “I thought we had litigated that conversation a generation ago, but here we are discussing it again.”

Hawkins continued, “For me, that’s a lot of the large harm of Trump: Are we going to start having these conversations again? Is the national debate going to be whether or not we should ban Muslims immigrating here? That’s something I don’t want to be a part of. That’s something I don’t want the Republican Party to be a part of.”

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One-Man Protest Tries to Sway Conservatives From Trump’s Divisiveness

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Chris Christie Slams Critics Who Mocked Him as Trump’s Hostage

by CorineLinton Posted on March 3, 2016

Mother Jones

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Responding to recent criticism that he has been overly occupied with Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie held a press conference on Thursday to defend his recent endorsement of the real estate magnate and reassure his state’s residents that he remains focused on the state’s agenda.

“I am not a full-time surrogate for Donald Trump,” Christie said. “I do not have a title or position in the Trump campaign. I am an endorser.”

Since Christie shocked the political world by by endorsing the GOP presidential front-runner—a move that gave establishment cred to Trump’s outsider campaign—several newspapers in New Jersey have derided Christie and called on him to resign, pointing to his extended absences from Trenton.

Christie’s endorsement of Trump has won him no praise within Republican circles. And on Super Tuesday night, when Trump racked up a string of significant victories, Christie appeared less than thrilled to be up on stage with him. He was wildly mocked on social media for looking like a hostage or a fellow with a profound case of buyer’s remorse. (Read this.)

Hogwash, Christie declared at the press conference: “I was standing there listening to him. All those arm-chair psychiatrists should give it a break. No, I wasn’t being held hostage.”

Still, he felt it was necessary to deny it.

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Chris Christie Slams Critics Who Mocked Him as Trump’s Hostage

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Republicans Decide to Boycott the Supreme Court Vacancy. Does This Remind You of Anyone?

by KarolynHDG Posted on February 23, 2016

Mother Jones

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The Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee have officially announced that they aren’t willing to even hold hearings for President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee—no matter who it is.1 There’s all the usual argle bargle about needing to “protect the will of the American people” blah blah blah, but none of that matters. They’re doing this because they want to do it and they have the power to do it. I doubt that Democrats would act much differently under similar circumstances.

That said, you can add me to the huge crowd of observers who are puzzled by the political tactics here. The obvious question is: Why refuse to even hold hearings? That just makes Republicans look sullen and obstructionist. Why not hold hearings normally, drag them out a little bit, and then vote down whoever Obama nominates? The result is the same, but Republicans look more like senators and less like small children throwing a temper tantrum.

I suppose the answer is that this is a good way of firing up their base, and they think that’s more important than appealing to the center. Fair enough. But that raises another question: What’s the best way to fire up the Republican base? I’m not trying to troll anyone here, but it seems like the answer is to hold hearings. That would keep the whole Supreme Court issue front and center for months on end. The base would be faced almost daily with the prospect of what a liberal justice would do; talk radio would go nuts; and there would be endless chances to find specific problems with the nominee—many of which would coincidentally require the production of reams of files and records to trawl through.

Democrats, conversely, would have less to get fired up about. Sure, they’d be unhappy, but they wouldn’t be able to carp endlessly about Republican obstruction. Their guy is getting a hearing, after all.

So it seems like holding hearings normally would be a better way to fire up the GOP base and a better way to keep the Democratic base a little quieter. It probably wouldn’t make a huge difference either way, but it’s still a win-win. What am I missing here?

1After which they undoubtedly went out for a beer and shared their bewilderment about the fact that so many Republicans have been trained to vote for a guy like Donald Trump. What could possibly have driven them in such a direction?

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Republicans Decide to Boycott the Supreme Court Vacancy. Does This Remind You of Anyone?

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