TAT readers,
Welcome to your weekend. Today I’m trying something a bit different since the midterms are on everyone’s mind. A little over four years ago I began this publication to write about national security threats and sadly, the most serious threat has become our own government. I hope to be able to slowly get back to talking about the long list of other national security threats, post midterms, but Trump will remain in office, DOJ will still be run by traitors and criminals and who knows what sort of un-American mayhem the Chief Justice John Roberts SCOTUS will continue to impose on us. Still, the world is a mess and that mess often involves serious individual and combined threats to the US, and the allies we had before this administration destroyed those relationships.
My typical daily routine begins with a couple of cups of coffee and reading the news and other reports for two or three hours. This is how I determine what I wish to share with all of you in these essays. Today’s essay will be me listing some of the articles and/ or reports that I found interesting for a reason or two regarding our midterms. After each, I will post a linked news article and follow it with a paragraph or so regarding my thoughts on what each article means to the midterms. Several of my recent essays have been rather long about the midterms and with the elections just a few days away, most of us have diminished attention spans for anything but. Today’s experiment is meant to respect our more limited time and attention.
As a prelude to what follows, I’ll just say that chaos, dysfunction, panic and distractions by the White House and Republican Party will frame most of what follows. Were this election not so critical to our future, some of what follows would be laughable at best, insane at worst. But here we are.
Here we go,
We might as well begin with something both desperate and insane. Of course, it comes from the White House and DOJ. As the Guardian reports, there are two Dan Sullivans running as Republicans on the Alaskan ballot against Mary Peltola, a half-indigenous woman on her mother’s side and a former congresswoman running as a democrat. Trump now claims to have ordered the DOJ to file a lawsuit demanding that Alaska not certify the election if the Republican loses, largely because they believe there will be too much confusion because the Republicans have the same name. Both candidates with the same name have different middle initials and Alaskans to this point have expressed no confusion about which is which. One is the sitting Senator and the other a teacher.
Mary Peltola, though locked in what is considered a dead-heat with the incumbent senator, Dan S. Sullivan, is recently showing increased momentum in what has become historically, Alaska’s most expensive race, with an estimated 80+ million already spent by both sides. Sullivan of course has been a Trump/ GOP lackey, and just like the rest of the Republicans in the senate. He voted for the Big Ugly Bill and to confirm everyone of Trump’s cabinet grotesquely incompetent and cruel picks. Although Peltola has a slight edge in the most recent polls, the senate seat is still considered a tossup.
Next up comes reporting from Politico based on panic by the administration. Trump’s tariffs, overwhelmingly despised by voters, are now being used by the White House to shore up Senator Susan Collin’s flagging campaign in Maine. Mind you, his commitment to reduce his tariffs on Canada, only apply to nine categories of products that are important to voters in Maine. This is just the latest in his attempts to buy voters with commitments, nearly always unfulfilled. For example, Americans have never received his promised tariff return checks of $2,000 although major corporations have, and his promise of a $5,000 check to everyone is contingent on whether or not Republicans can hold on to the House and the Senate.
While there’s little substance yet to this promise, it has been made clear that Trump’s tariffs on Canadian goods, will not decrease. His commitment is only for those nine categories of goods intended to help out Collin’s immediate needs. Roughly 100 new products will be added to the already long list of goods with tariffs in order to make up for those allegedly going to Collin’s constituents. Most Maine insiders see this attempt by Trump to assist Collins, as “too little, too late.” By all accounts, Mainers are done with the false promises from the Republican Party. Aren’t we all?
Here’s another nutty story to most of us, but something high up on a malignant narcissist’s agenda. This story from The Washington Post, and reported elsewhere widely, is about revenge for perceived slights. In an extremely unusual situation, the FBI arrested a career analyst and another high-ranking Counterintelligence officer for allegedly not telling the Trump/ MAGA version in court, about Hunter Biden’s laptop. Neither have been indicted by a grand jury as of yet and considering the typical lack of evidence for these revenge arrests and investigations, it’s hard to see that this will go any further than did former FBI director Comey’s, which was tossed out of court for having no substance.
Even though the emperor has no clothes, it would seem that no Republican in Congress or the administration, has enough of a spine left to speak truth to power. This type of revenge is an identifying factor of those suffering malignant narcissism. It doesn’t matter that his popularity and administration is collapsing around him, he is powerless to stop seeking revenge against anyone he perceives has in some way, wronged him. Republican, Democrat or otherwise, it would appear that he feels like the American people have wronged him, hence his abuse of all of us.
Here we have a story of The Treasury Department attempting to convince voters, just a few days until the election, that Republicans actually care about the people. From the very beginning of his term as Secretary of the Treasury, Scott Bessent’s smug pompous demeanor has won him no friends outside of high-level administration officials, who depend on him to facilitate much of their corruption and treasury theft. Here’s the background for this story; the one piece of true bi-partisan legislation this past summer was a housing bill intended to address the critical housing shortage of 4 million units in the US. Although Congress passed the law, Trump refused to sign it, because he was pouting over the failure of Republicans in congress, to pass the SAVE Act, a heinous voter suppression bill.
Now Bessent, want to use elements of this unsigned law, to convince Americans that this administration really does care about them. Like nearly everything coming from this administration, Bessent’s efforts regarding these elements of the housing bill, are the typical smoke and mirrors, never to be fulfilled. Higher interest rates and the affordability crisis are a double-whammy that is predicted to keep the national real estate market in trouble through at least, most of 2027. Nothing in Bessent’s efforts can change these factors. Like most Republican promises in the Trump era, they are best ignored.
And then there are the endless promises. It’s not like either Trump or the GOP have a winning record on keeping promises, but heaven knows, there are still tens of millions of Americans, that believe them and even worse, don’t hold him accountable when he reneges on them. The closest his followers have come to pushing back against his false promises, was before the bi-partisan bill to release the TrumpStein files. It’s been nearly a year since the law passed and the Republican congress refuses to pressure the White House or DOJ to comply with the law, with less than one handful of exceptions.
And this is where I become concerned about the midterms. As I have explained in detail in past essays, once someone has fully identified with an ideology, it is nearly impossible to alter their identity. Those folks have been both brainwashed and conned, and the odds of them changing are slim and none. It’s just how human brains are wired. Despite the small venues and crowds at rallies or even the disillusionment within Republican MAGA circles, these adherents to their fake conservatism or Project 2025 ideology, will in significant numbers hold their noses, and vote Republican anyway. In short, most GOP voters, may at least partially believe his empty promises and vote against theirs and our own interests, again.
I saved this story for last for a reason. This ad campaign by Vivek Ramaswamy has now become infamous as one of the most vile campaign ads I’ve witnessed in my lifetime. As many know, I was raised in Ohio and still keep up with friends and family. This type of ad had that rare capability, to break through the brainwashing of Republicans. Despite a majority of Buckeyes losing their way during the Trump-era, those of them already tiring of his perpetual dishonesty, cruelty and corruption, will likely see this ad as the proverbial, “straw that broke the camel’s back.” I have heard and seen outrage from friends over this issue and just today, two new polls have changed to “likely Democrat” instead of “tossup” for the governor’s race.
Ramaswamy is now in a terrible position stuck between Trump, who insists on him continuing to run the ad and the voters of Ohio, who are rightfully furious and ashamed of him. It’s been said that Ohio is one of the most polite states in the Union and growing up there, I would have to agree. The viciousness of the allegations in the ad, coupled with the fact that Dr. Amy Acton has been open about the deep traumas she and her brother experienced in childhood, legitimately makes her a victim of Trump and her opponent. To rub salt into the wound, VP JD Vance who grew up roughly a half an hour from where I grew up, joined Ramaswamy and like Trump supports the ad, encouraging Ramaswamy to continue running it. There really is no limit to how low today’s Republicans will go to get their way.
A quick summary
These are only a handful of the political articles overwhelming us at this point in an election year. Still, they are insightful as to GOP tactics, fears and ensuing panic of massive losses. Pundits and polling entities, who think in reality and in math, are missing something, just as they have since the 2016 election. Life is not data. Life is about human beings and how they see reality. This is a particular professional specialty of mine. These pundits and pollsters have been wrong often in the Trump/ MAGA era. I’m not saying that their optimism is fully misplaced, but there are several “tossup” races for congress all across the nation. That should tell you that the brainwashing is still working among long-time Trump followers.
GOP voters vote because of Trump, not because they are Republicans. It’s his identity that they have internalized and that is all that matters to them, even if they don’t see it in themselves. My bottom-line is that in order to take back both the House and the Senate, these next ten days require the most intense effort of the entire campaign. It’s the only way to overcome the so-called “Trump effect.” There is a great deal of psychology behind this but all that matters, is that we know we must “sprint through the finish line,” not just up to it. I look forward to do so alongside all of you. Take back both houses of congress and then, we can begin to hand our republic back to the true patriots of the resistance.
My very best for your weekend,
Paul