I’m new to this substack. This stuff is bracing, but it makes something resonate in me like a piano string. Obama’s presidency was aesthetically satisfying after the idiocy of Bush, but does anyone else remember the depressing tepidness of what we were offered at a time when we had SIXTY Democratic senators?
Yes, the Biden presidency is deeply compromised, but the madness of the Republicans might finally have allowed Democrats to shift the window back just a bit. Why compromise with lunatics?
Anyway … thanks, Sarah Kendzior for some unvarnished truth.
Thank you! And yes, I remember the disappointment of Obama's early years but I didn't understand it fully until later. What blows my mind now is the way the much more recent progressive Biden 2020 platform has been forgotten, as if it never existed, along with the Dems having the presidency, house, senate, and general approval of the US public for two years while barely trying to enact the policies they ran on
I'll never forgive Biden for lying about the Build Back Better bill. He told the progressives they had to split it up so they could pass infrastructure; then he said he wouldn't sign one bill without the other. Well, that's exactly what he did. The BBB had a bunch of nice things for women and children😞
I'm amazed at the ignorance of so many of these comments. I understand that you are young, but before giving an opinion, study history and more recent events. You are Disappointed in Obama for not instantly fixing the worst economic crash since the Republican Great Depression of 1929? The economic destruction which was caused by three decades of republican policies. Why don't you remember how the minority republicans were able to bring Congress to a halt thanks to Mitch McConnell using THE FILIBUSTER to stop any Democratic legislation! The republican minority screwed the American people by deliberately slowing our recovery; they even voted against a jobs bill which they had once supported. Just to screw Obama. STUDY MORE !
Who is young? The author of the article who has earned a PhD in a field of study that is quite germane to the current political environment in America? Whatever the case, you sound arrogant. You reveal your allegiance in the way you articulate your disdain for Republicans while willfully ignoring many justifiable criticisms of the Democrats. Lewis Black famously described the Democratic Party as the party of bad ideas and the Republican Party as the party of no ideas. He has yet to be proven wrong. And because he has not been proven wrong is a big part of the reason a lifelong fraud has a chance of winning a second term. Both parties are self-serving malignancies killing their host.
Young, hahaha! I earned that PhD while raising a baby who is now seventeen years old. This lady’s comments remind me of my husband putting “29” on my birthday cake as a joke for a decade and a half ;) Only she’s serious!
I do wish people would read the sections of my articles on political cults more closely…
Anyway I agree with most of what you’re saying here, except that the Dems sometimes have good ideas — which is why it’s so sad that most do not attempt to act on those ideas or fight for their constituents. Also the GOP does have ideas — terrible ideas, over 900 pages of them! But I’m with you on the “self serving malignancies killing their hosts” — that is indeed the end result.
Fair enough. I remain confused by so many things regarding Democratic strategy. In my judgment, the Dems continue to fail to read the room and truly understand why the Republican nominee exists. I always enjoy your writing; thank you for sharing it.
This reminds me of Brexit. Throughout negotiations the UK refused to accept that the EU worked the way it worked.
Trade experts have posted that they've held countless briefings with ministers and members of parliament of both parties informing them of how EU trade procedures work with non-members and what was possible outside of the EU Single Market (which had eliminated all goods border controls) They didn't want to know.
Eight years later they still don't! In consequence the UK trade border
for goods coming from the EU is still porous because they daren't apply full checks lest the delays created slow down food and vital goods. On top of that they didn't bother building adequate facilities (unlike on the EU side) or training anything like the number of customs staff required.
It isn't incompetence it's wilful.
Politicians have so many expert resources a letter or a phone call away.
If they personally can't read the room you betcha there are consultants out there that can advise them.
Let me, please, correct the misimpression that Obama ever had a working 60-vote majority in the Senate.
Sen. Ted Kennedy, dying of a brain tumor, cast his last vote in the Senate in March 2009. He was too ill thereafter to do so, although he didn't die until late summer. The 60th Democrat, Al Franken of Minnesota, wasn't sworn in until almost four months after Kennedy's last vote. So Obama never had a working, filibuster-proof majority.
You can criticize Obama for a number of things that he did or failed to do, but "failing to act on a filibuster-proof majority" is not one of them.
Thank you for reminding us of this timeline. I supported Al Franken and remember he recount challenge very well. I donated to the recount campaign and got to meet Franken twice as a result.... the second time in D.C. when he celebrated his success. The time it took made Obama's job harder... but what also mad it harder (and make me angry to this day) is how Franken was kicked out of the Senate by his fellow Democrats (especially a female Senator whose name I will not mention) all because of a stupid photograph taken during a USO tour! Talk about the Democrats shooting themselves in the foot! The party disgusts me when it does stuff like this. SMH
Ok how’s this? Obama was a terrible negotiator who negotiated himself down from the public option and other policies where he limited his negotiating position before the talks even started. McConnell ate him for breakfast… And we ended up with an incrementalist President who didn’t accomplish nearly as much as he might have.
OK, granted, I'd remembered that Franken's seating in the Senate was delayed forever, but had forgotten that Ted Kennedy had died before he was seated.
But the Dems did have enough votes to repeal or limit the stupid filibuster. (I've had it with Democrats being institutionalists while the Republicans are setting fire to literally everything. As if the GOP would maintain the filibuster for 30 seconds more than was convenient for them.) And they should have done it to pass any number of important and impactful pieces of legislation.
I think the fair critique of government is that has done nothing impactful for decades on any of the major issues of the day (except the ACA), in spite of broad consensus on these policies: immigration, affordable housing, gun violence, real and immediate climate action, democracy protection and expansion. And there are so many other ways that the government could affect real and lasting change: mass transit, food policy,. I can't think of most of it because my view of government has become increasingly cramped over the 44 years since Reagan.
If Democrats can't finally make a full-throated defense of government as a force for good, well, we deserve what we get.
Kennedy didn't die before Franken was seated, but he had become too ill by then to make it to the Senate for votes.
I agree with some of your other points, however. Most Dem congresscritters have to be pushed kicking and screaming, in the midst of a crisis, and with the exception of the ACA, absent a crisis, they don't act.
That said, the Senate is now institutionally stacked against a Dem filibuster-proof majority -- states get two senators irrespective of size, so it's possible for 51 senators representing < 40% of the country's population to enact policy. So if Dems are going to get anything done, they must not only hold the WH, House, and Senate at once, they're going to have to kill the filibuster, at least for certain urgent bills.
A lot of Democrats will say, "We shouldn't do that because that's what the Republicans would do!" To which I would reply, "Have you not been paying attention to the GOP for the past 30 years? If the GOP grabs the Senate this fall, killing the filibuster is what they are GOING to do."
Obama's administration was shackled by Mitch McConnell, who determined from day one to undermine and block anything Obama attempted. How did he know he could do this, with the Democrats in control of congress? THE FILIBUSTER. He used it as the ultimate weapon. And he was very successful at it. He had republicans vote against the interest of the people, just to weaken Obama. The republicans cared nothing for us, despite us suffering through the worst economic crisis since the Republican Great Depression of 1929. Before opining on Obama's 'failures', learn more about the situation.
Maybe you wrote this article before Kamala outlined her policies, but she has in fact enunciated several economic policies:
Food prices
After years of polling showing that Americans are worried about inflation, Harris is aiming to contain prices where they have often been most conspicuously felt — at the grocery store. She’s promising to, during her first 100 days in office, send Congress proposed federal limits on price increases for food producers and grocers. Harris also is seeking new authority for the Federal Trade Commission and attorneys general in states across the country to enact steeper punishments for violators. She also wants to use government regulators to crack down on mergers and acquisitions among large food industry businesses that the vice president argues have contributed to higher prices.
Housing
Harris is calling for the construction of 3 million new housing units over four years, which she says will ease a “serious housing shortage in America.” She also plans to promote legislation creating a new series of tax incentives for builders who construct “starter” homes sold to first-time homebuyers.
She also wants a $40 billion innovation fund — doubling a similar pot of money created by the Biden administration — for businesses building affordable rental housing units. Harris also wants to speed up permitting and review processes to get housing stock to the market more quickly.
WATCH: Why lower-income renters in Austin are struggling to find affordable housing
Harris further says she can lower rental costs by limiting investors who buy up homes in bulk, as well as curbing the use of price-setting tools that she argues encourage collusion to increase profits among landlords. She also wants to expand a Biden administration plan providing $25,000 in potential down payment assistance to help some renters buy a home, so that it will include a much larger swath of first-time home buyers across the country.
The vice president also has endorsed repurposing some federal land to make room for new affordable housing, an idea that Biden endorsed while still running for president and that Trump has also spoken about favorably.
Taxes and medical costs
Harris wants to speed up a Biden administration effort that has allowed Medicare and other federal programs to negotiate with drugmakers to lower the cost of prescription medications, aiming to cut the price tags of some of the most expensive and most commonly used drugs by roughly 40 percent to 80 percent starting in 2026. She’s also promised to promote competition with steps to increase transparency within pharmaceutical company pricing practices.
READ MORE: FDA says Florida can import prescription drugs from Canada
Harris also pledged to work with state entities to cancel $7 billion of medical debt for up to 3 million qualifying Americans.
The vice president also proposed to make permanent a $3,600 per child tax credit approved through 2025 for eligible families, while offering a new $6,000 tax credit for those with newborn children. She says a Harris administration would work to expand the Earned Income Tax Credit to cut taxes for some frontline workers by up to $1,500 and reduce taxes on healthcare plans offered on the marketplace created by the Affordable Care Act.
I remember Biden promising to pull out all the stops to battle COVID in honor of his deceased son Beau, who would have died from COVID during cancer treatment. Instead, Biden prematurely declared the pandemic over. We are now entering the fifth school year of the COvID pandemic with cases surging and mask bans passing as “public safety” measures.
My trust in these promises from the Harris campaign is at rock bottom.
Yes, Biden's covid policy is one of the worst things he's done. It was when I began to sharply lose trust in the administration, and it coincided with it becoming obvious that Garland's DOJ was not going to punish any of the leading seditionists, mafiosos, or Trump. This all happened at once around May 2021. I'd really love to see a tell-all on the CDC under both Trump and Biden, because it's just criminal. I know people who got long covid and one who died because they believed they were safe with the vaccines and should no longer mask; they never thought Biden would just lie to them like that and had considered the CDC to be a dependable, scientifically based organization.
Your writing and analysis really is remarkable. And the way you weave in personal anecdotes without losing the big picture.
Have you written or do you plan to write anything digging more into the COVID policy stuff? I think this is an especially complex and fraught topic (I realize they all are, but some like Gaza actually seem quite straightforward to me). What bothered me most about Biden's policy has much less to do with easing of official restrictions (especially since Omicron) than the withdrawal of funding and support for infrastructure like testing, medical staffing and resources, ventilation standards, safety nets and sick leave for those impacted, research on Long COVID, and future pandemic preparedness. And as you say, generally pretending it was no longer a pressing concern, just because more than 50% of the population would be OK with that. And all the lying. Ironically, many still accused the administration as too strict or alarmist because of all the offloading of responsibility onto individuals, when they probably would support the kind of long-term social investments that really matter.
I think you can fall on the side of repealing half-assed mask mandates and reopening schools, and yet continue to treat COVID as a very serious priority in every other respect.
I may write about it more but I’m not an epidemiologist so I feel hesitant diving into the science. However I do know when people are being lied to and screwed over and that one of the leading indicators of a fledgling autocracy is the erasure of public health data from public view. I did write about covid in my book THEY KNEW but it was more about official responsibility and betrayal of the public. It’s incredibly frustrating to me that there is not money for free testing, healthcare, treatment for long covid, research on long covid, *ventilation upgrades in schools* and many other things they could go to mitigate this. I’m just glad I don’t live on Long Island where they banned masks. I’m worried they’ll ban them in NYC next and I worry about all the people there with cancer or other diseases that render covid extremely deadly, both the New Yorkers living there and those coming to places like Sloan Kettering where everyone should be masking up.
If the mask ban comes to Nashville I won't be able to leave my home! 21 months of Long Covid and I mask everywhere! To his credit Bernie Sanders has released a Long Covid Moonshot Legislative proposal. We'll see if it flies~~~
Thanks for all these thoughts. Yes, availability/transparency of data is so key; meant to list that too as part of infrastructure. The mask bans....wow.
Like the live streamed genocide in Palestine, the issue of COVID is billed as “complex” when it’s not. We knew from the outset that COVID was a novel virus. Biden’s policy is eugenicist. Kill and further maim the medically vulnerable and disabled that need to access healthcare in now unmasked medical facilities. Tell “healthy” people they can handle the virus and let them roll the dice with long COVID, only to find out once they are “unlucky” that they have few to no treatment options. It’s not complicated. Masks work. Vaccines reduce disease severity. Air filtration reduces transmission.
Completely agree about the lying and downplaying. I guess I was thinking more of the complexities around how the public has made sense of COVID in particular, and various responses to it. But maybe you're right that it's not so different.
Yeah, about that. She's a staunch supporter of Israel's right to defend itself and she will continue the genocide. That's a red line for me. Good to know it's not one for you.
Just a reminder... if we don't preserve democracy by rejecting Trump / fascism... we will never be able to change our position towards Israel. Trump and Netanyahu are both cut from the same clothe. Just my 2 cents.
Genocide is a red line for me. I wouldn't let Kamala watch my child, so I'm certainly not going to vote for someone who's going to assist in the slaughter of children. How do you sleep at night?
Thanks for asking. I sleep at night knowing I still live in a country where I have the freedom to think what I want to think and vote for who I want to vote for... just like you are free to say you would not "let Kamala watch my child".
And thank you for blessing my heart. We will have to agree to disagree regarding whether we currently live in a democracy or not... another thing we still have the freedom to do.
God bless you and your ability to choose what you think and say.
Certainly a gauntlet of progressive programs to capture the eye and ear. Maybe you could fill in some blanks on just one of them, 3 million new affordable homes?
Given federal land might be brought into play to allow for that, you will need new roads and basic infrastructure like water, electric and sewer to start.
Who is going to build these homes? Most companies of scale already have considerable obligation.
How are you going to generate the materials required like concrete, lumber, drywall, electric, plumbing, roofing, etc from industry that struggles to accommodate current demand?
And mostly, where does the manpower come from? Currently we have less than four percent unemployed and most of those completely unqualified or unwilling to do a construction trade or manual labor.
Maybe you’ve figured it out but to me it looks like a pipe dream that even in the best scenario would take a decade or more to realize. At best I think you could produce a couple hundred thousand homes in four years.
There is no way in hell Kamala will use price controls on flour, cooking oil, and eggs. We know this because Kamala didn't speak in specifics and didn't talk about bringing back the grain reserves and other food reserves, or about the USDA Commodities program. Even if she did I would not trust her.
Those are all wonderful in theory, but even one of the "simplest" ones - floated by Biden in fact - about limiting the rate at which rental prices can go up is systemically painful to even implement.
How are you going to limit rental prices from going up if you don't have a history of those prices?
Is this based on the market, or individual rentals? Who submits data and is it mandatory?
Who tracks data and handles landlords who break the nonexistant-law?
How long does it take to arbitrate?
Do you mean increases to an existing rental agreement, or do you mean the rental price on the market, period? Because landlords were already circumventing the former by just cancelling leases unilaterally and demanding a new lease agreement signed under the new, jacked up price.
Would that be state or federal?
How does any of the above mesh with the recent decisions in the Circuit and Supreme courts that undermine the Government's ability to delegate things to the alphabet agencies?
We aren't Trump voters, we actually expect realistic goals with trackable deliverables.
I wish someone would take Senator Warren’s 2020 presidential platform and run on that. It really disgusted me when people mocked her for “having plans” because everybody else is running on an autopilot to nowhere. Thanks for your insight, as always, Sarah!
Yes I liked Warren’s plans! I was glad she had plans even if I sometimes disagreed with the content. It’s honestly hard for me to come up with candidates who didn’t have plans during that primary. It was a baseline expectation. Bernie had plans and a philosophy, Buttigieg had plans that kept morphing according to consultants but at least they were plans, Castro (underrated candidate) had plans. I’m trying to figure out when Americans let go of the basic expectation of their leaders having plans and I think it was when the Biden admin failed to enact any of the most basic plans, in particular protecting people from Covid and holding Trump and his cohort accountable for their crimes.
Too many political candidates run for election without plans , platforms , or even a glimmer of an original idea . Too many voters don’t seem to be bothered about it . So , when a candidate has plans , they are often mocked - much like Sen. Warren . Our Presidential Debates have completely devolved into middle school bullying : no policy agenda will cross their lips , because the audience and media is looking for ‘hits’ ,not substance .
With such a flawed political system that we have ( I’m trying to always remind myself that it’s only ever been an Experiment ) , we can only hope that our fellow voters can choose wisely , and that we thankfully still have the right to vote .
Senator Warren's plan was actual work. Every one in every corner of the sustem would have had to show up to do the work. Showing off would have had to be the thankless victory lap of being satisfied that you did your best. Not performative puffing.
I already know how I intend to vote for president. That doesn't make me a Harris cultist. She has said she will have a news conference, a one-on-one sitdown interview with a major journalist, or both between the end of the convention this week and the end of the month. That's soon enough for me.
It's not as if we don't know ANYTHING about Harris. We know what she ran on in 2020. We know of at least some places where she may deviate from Biden's positions. We don't know everything, but we know enough to know that she is far preferable to Donald Trump -- and far more likely to be responsive to persuasion from the public after she is inaugurated than Trump is.
No, that's not great, but until Jan. 21, I'll take it. Then will be soon enough to start calling her to account for the positions with which we disagree.
I would say so in this particular instance (I don't know if that's true as a general trend). I don't see a path by which any action other than voting for Harris (or, God forbid, whoever the Dem nominee is if for any reason she can't see it through) takes us to a better democracy.
We know that she fully supports the genocide but I don’t see how she is far preferable to Trump, marginally at best. I understand that not everyone voting for her is a Kamala cultist, but if you vote for her while disagreeing with the genocide; what does that say about your expectations of her? I understand the lesser of two evils but that doesn’t soothes me morally and recent history shows that it doesn’t work, it slows down the autocratic decline at best. Once elected will you have zero leverage.
I know of no evidence that she "fully supports" the genocide, and I think we've got a lot better chance of stopping it with her as president than with Trump as president. A LOT better. Bibi pulling for Trump should tell you all you need to know.
What it says about my expectations of her is this: I'm 64 freakin' years old, and I spent almost 30 years covering elections. I am absolutely realistic about them, even as I rage sometimes that we don't have better candidates. Two things can be true at once: Harris can be deeply flawed and still FAR better than Trump. The time to go after your perfect candidate is in the primary, and if your candidate doesn't do well in the primary, well, that's how our system works. And, yes, it sucks, but it sucks less than every other system ever devised.
At the moment, slowing down the autocratic decline is the best we can do, so let's unite to DO that and then work toward a time when we can do even more. False equivalence and nihilism, toward which you are trending, will only elect Trump and put us in a fast car on a short, wide road to hell. Actual Holocaust survivors have said so, and I believed them the first time.
She does, if she didn’t she could just say it, it’s not that hard. I read ‘chance’, ‘belief’, no evidence that she’d be significantly better though. Need I mention that there was no ‘primary’. Letting go of the quantitative difference between the two, all I am saying is that it’s not enough for my vote (out of principle and as a message). If she cannot even say that she is against an ongoing genocide, I am not the one being a nihilist, she is, literally.
<<She does, if she didn’t she could just say it, it’s not that hard. I read ‘chance’, ‘belief’, no evidence that she’d be significantly better though.>>
Dude. Have you SEEN Donald Trump?
And she has said she opposes genocide. She just hasn't phrased it exactly as you want it. "If she didn't, she could just say it, it's not that hard" isn't proof in any reputable newsroom in the country.
Here we are: “but Trump” is not an argument, this is the “Hunter Biden’s laptop” of the libs.
I despise Trump as much as the next guy btw.
It’s the burden of proof fallacy, I don’t have to prove that she is supporting genocide, she has to prove to us that she is against it. (Inaction defaults to a support) All the evidence is against her so far. It might be painful to admit but it doesn’t make it less true.
And in an election system in which you have two and only two meaningful choices, "but Trump" is the argument that, forgive me, trumps all others. Arguing otherwise betrays moral stillbirth.
Seriously? No difference? You obviously don’t give a fig about women’s rights or the environment. But hey, if it doesn’t affect you personally, why care about anyone else, amirite?
I’m ok with no primary. Hell, I’m more than ok! Kamala Harris both earned and deserves it. I accept that positive progressive change takes a loooong time to gain popular support across our vast nation (and in turn force the hands with the deep pockets). Dark money is behind both sides, but there are still some fundamentals that the two sides of the coin don’t see eye to eye on. There is the core difference of the repubs losing the thread of actually governing, let alone their stated and expressed goals of imposing the doctrine of white Christian nationalism on the entire populace. These are some of the many reasons I find more compelling differences than similarities between the parties at this juncture in time.
Marginal differences, mostly lip service. I would appreciate you not accusing me without any basis.(I do care very much about everyone’s rights and the climate crisis btw more than Biden apparently) How do you explain my care for Palestinian people then? My argument is not so much ideological here, it’s more on the effectiveness of tactics.
But on care and ideology, I maintain that no issue is more profound and universal than the Palestinian cause. I believe that it is fundamentally connected to most of these issues that we like to see as Trumpian (Racism, misogyny, police state, militarization, autocracy, neoliberalism, climate change…)✌️
I beg to differ that women’s rights and access to abortion in our nation is more than a marginal concern. Regressive right wing policies are having real life and death impact on women and girls throughout the nation. But that’s just my perspective as a woman. I don’t endorse the atrocity that Israel is carrying out in Gaza. As another commenter said, Netanyahu and trump are cut from the same cloth with dictatorial ambitions. I do not believe that of Harris but there’s no denying the fact that wealthy donors behind both parties are the ones actually calling the shots. So I’m not sure it matters what our president thinks about the issue as even the honest ones are ultimately beholden to dark money ever since Citizens United.
Agreed on all points. Not what I said though. I did not call these issues marginal, I called the difference of Dems position/actions towards these said issues marginal. Dems talk about it but don’t deliver. Abortion and its tie to a corrupt SC is case in point (for abortion and else…) what did the Dems do ro remedy that. Impeachment? Increasing the number of Justices? Put it in to law? Nothing. (Fear of failure not being an argument not to try btw) You seem to agree with me that candidates are essentially the same due to the nature of their donors. If we don’t send any electoral signal that we’re not OK with no primary and no genocide, what is next? Open bar: send Manchin or Sinema…
No kidding. I don't understand how anyone can back this admin's sadistic policy in Gaza. It's what I want Harris most to change. I nearly brought up what is happening to Palestinian babies in this article since I was writing about the hopes a new parent has for their child -- but it is so dark, it felt tonally appropriate to lump in the horror they endure with my comparatively small complaints. The children of Gaza are in pieces that their parents carry in bags. It's unbearable to even see the images and the agony of Palestinian parents is beyond my comprehension.
Regarding this administration's policy towards Israel... I hope someday a book is written about how Israel managed to gain so much influence over politicians in America. I often read about Putin's influence over the GOP... a relatively recent development all things considered. But Israel's influence over the Democratic Party (and I suppose the GOP too) has existed for a whole lot longer. It's almost as if they have dirt on America's political class... but that's just a wild guess on my part. Whatever the cause, our inability to say no to Israel (and I know the Middle East has oil we want... but come on!) seems to be way out of control and in need of being exposed. All of this is my way of saying I don't blame Biden or Harris. They appear not to have a choice in the matter... as upsetting as that is for me to write.
There are a few good books about the Israeli lobby and US politics, probably the most famous of which is Stephen Walt's -- but his is from 2007. It was published to enormous controversy even though it was meticulously fact-checked. Robert Friedman did some great investigative reporting in the 1990s on the really dark side of US-Israeli politics -- collaborations between the FBI and the JDL/Kahanists. Every book that attempts to cover these topics nowadays gets censored. There was a bit of an open period around 2017-2019 when I managed to get Hiding in Plain Sight out. As you know, that book is about a transnational criminal syndicate and names a large number of countries, but the main three are the US, Russia, and Israel, and it was only with the sections on Israel (and Robert Maxwell/Jeffrey Epstein in particular) that I ran into trouble even though it was all legally vetted and footnoted intensely. The atmosphere is even worse now because there is more self-censorship, a terrible journalism economy, a genuine and awful rise in anti-semitism that makes people understandably wary of broaching the topic, and new laws that restrict speech on Israel being passed in certain institutions and in certain states.
Thank you for responding. And please accept my apology regarding you mentioning Israel in "Hiding In Plain Sight". America continues to be a place founded on great principles that were very poorly implemented from the beginning and continue to be only slightly better implemented today (women and Blacks now technically having the right to vote).
I saw a comment recently that said "Given all the shit happening in America, you might think this country was cursed.... almost as if the nation was built on ancient Indian burial grounds!" I almost spit out my coffee when I read that!
For sure, I loved the article as is. I have been increasingly ashamed of having supported and defended Obama so adamantly for so long, the relatability was quite cathartic.
Jeezus, Sarah. You keep reminding me why I have to be straight and not bullshit myself.
Yes, i was getting the kamala vibes for a bit but you remind me to think with care - even though it hurts.
I wanna believe we can get ourselves out of this hellhole of America today!! But hell, I don’t know what America is anymore.
Obama was a charade. He caved and “led from behind” (wtf was that!?) but he did make healthcare possible for some people who couldn’t get it before. Was it worth it ? to put up with all the other BS? The continuation of the forever wars? The ridiculousness of the Eric Holder Attorney General years? JFC! Will we ever have an attorney general who can do anything good goddamnit?
James Carville used to say it’s the economy stupid. But I want to say even louder, it’s the rule of law stupid. We have no damn rule of law in this country and it seems that nobody notices.
Are you the only one talking about this? Anyway. I’m glad I subscribe to this. I appreciate you. Even though it hurts.
This piece brought back bittersweet memories of my toddler racing around the living room on election night 2008 saying “Ooooobama! Ooooobama!” Crazy to think that a man who we thought would be a transformational political figure now just makes sad girl Spotify playlists for my daughters to laugh at.
It's surreal. Watching his dystopian Netflix movie was particularly unnerving. His presidency meant so much to so many people and it is sad what its legacy is (and like I said, an extremely complicated legacy since he entered office when so many earth-shattering events were converging -- I didn't even list them all because it would have gone on forever)
But yeah, as a kid, my daughter loved him too, and I was so happy back then that he was the first president she would remember, instead of George W Bush, who was POTUS when she was born
Yeah when it came to popularity with preschoolers Obama could hold his own against Cailou, Curious George and Martha Speaks. If only he was equally effective going up against Mitch McConnell and John Boehner…
I remember reading what Michele Obama said, that they had to pitch perfect in ‘everything’ they did. Being the first Black president, every move he made was watched so intently that any move away from so called norms and he would have been buried even more than he was. VP Kamala Harris is tagged as ‘unburdened’ - history teaches so let’s hope she’s learned the lesson.
Your writing makes me often stop to absorb the beauty of your words. At 75, I have a different world view but I appreciate your insightful writing from a different angle. A century’s worth of political events since Trump’s near assassination to today compressed in a few weeks. I hope you continue to write.
Yes, I agree. I have always admired her elegant use of just the right word (hmmm, I wish my keyboard had italics…).
I must now have a think about her view of Obama, which I agree with but rather shamefacedly, because hitherto I had thought I was the only one to hold it…
I’m early GenX so I’ve experienced more-Carter inflation & gas lines. Reagan union busting & welfare queen vilification. Made it to Bill Clinton-then Monica. Obama. Deep breaths. Every day for 8 years I thought he was going be assassinated.
Now we have a staged fake assassination on our hands. Why? Stephen Sondheim teaches us that “Lincoln, who got mixed reviews, because of you John, now gets only raves.” This is a song called Ballad of Booth. Trump definitely trying to gin up polls by this crap.
To your substack: I disagree. The Harris campaign has laid out some of her plans for a Harris Administration. I’m okay with no in depth items. Why? The main stream media will only attack it & spit it out to the general public in sound bites that will never be fact checked. It’s like Trump can’t put a coherent sentence together, forgets what state he’s actually in, & here’s why that’s bad for Kamala Harris. The NYTIMES & WaPo are complicit as are all other news outlets.
The Harris campaign has released some information about plans for voter integrity. It’s being led my Marc Elias, a lawyer. People can google this.
Sarah, I have always loved your writing. I was working at an investment bank in 2008. I was working across the street from the south tower as a plane hit it (I was in the - Deutsche Bank building). I have witnessed catastrophe super close up. The dot com crash? Uh yeah right after college. Carter-Reagan-Bush I-a few ok years-Bush II (hanging chads) then jump off the Verrazano Bridge. Yet here I am. My body is broken. As Sondheim also teaches us, “I’m still here.”
You write as if you’ve lived thru the worst. Girl, no. You have a freaking PhD. I was not afforded that opportunity. No one could help me or would help me with that path. I was fortunate enough to pay my way through undergrad & it was not easy. I’m proud of what I accomplished. I would love to go back to school now. Even CUNY laughs at my butt.
Please do not denigrate Madam Vice President without paying more attention to the clear & present danger of Donald Trump. You write as if sure I would not vote for him & Project 2025 sucks butt yet women may never vote again. I ask you to try to recall how you felt the day Roe v Wade was overturned. Please do remember that Donald Trump has full immunity for prosecution of any crimes he may commit his next term in office.
Anyone who quotes Sondheim will always have my ear. Sarah has indeed lived through the worst, but only in so far as we ALL have. She uses a personal lens to show us what is happening to us collectively. And rest assured, she knows that Kamala is the best hope we have. Despite a snarky comment below, I don't think you were being hyperbolic about expressing your fears that women could be denied the vote. The GOP is overtly misogynistic--they don't even bother to hide it anymore. A very close relative recently told me I shouldn't have a personal stake in women's reproductive rights because I am now too old to bear children. Under a president Rump, that right to vote could be denied to us all; isn't that what he is telling us? Believe him!! Please keep the faith, and I look forward to checking out her voter integrity plan under Marc Elias. I hadn't yet clocked that.
So Scott, in 2016 did you imagine that in a few years we'd be hearing regular stories about women who have pregnancies that are endangering their health being told to wait in their cars in the parking lot of the ER to be nearby when they got close enough to dying to be treated legally? Or 10-year-old rape victims having to travel 1,000 miles in order not to give birth to her rapist's baby? Or women being sent home to miscarry and bleed out on their bathroom floors?
You have a male name so I'll assume you are male (apologies if you are not). You mock the OP's comment but if you're not a woman you can't understand the existential dread women feel at the prospect of another Trump term. Not being allowed to vote sounds ridiculous -- until you think about how quickly we lost the right to bodily autonomy.
Did you not hear JD Vance, the Vice Presidential nominee, say that women who don’t have children, “miserable childless cat ladies,” should not be able to vote because they don’t have a stake in the future of our country? He also does not want women in the workplace. Mark Robinson, South Carolina gubernatorial candidate has said he wants to go back to the time women could not vote. These men are not alone in their sentiments. Vance’s biggest donor, Peter Thiel, has also been on the record with these same words about women not voting. It happens slowly then all at once. IJS
And I know people who think that Democrats are still the party of working people and actually give a fuck about anything other than their 401K balance. You can’t fix stupid. And I therefore refuse to take accountability for the stupid of others.
One of my main focuses has always been on SCOTUS. I remember campaigning for Bill Clinton’s 1st campaign wearing a little silver coat hangar pin: indicative of the fragility of Roe. I’ve always said “the main thing is the Supreme Court !” Of course, no one listened…now they know. Maybe.
Feels like the image consultants, special interest mercenaries, and a generation of brainwashed sleeper cells in the administrative layer of the political class have made the actual business of the people's business a byproduct. A side hustle. The main event has become a simulacrum in which inititatives are festooned with traps and mines, loopholes intentionally engineered to let corrupt officials skim the cream and also get their jollies when ostensibly decent policies devastate our communities.
I miss your (Sarah's) voice on the Gaslit Nation podcast, which I had subscribed to. I keep putting off subscribing here because I'm a retiree living within my no-longer-employed income and can't afford to support the 8 or 10 substack writers that I would really like to support and subscribe to. So I'll keep dreaming of less expensive subscriptions and maybe eventually break down and subscribe to 1 or 2 more. Thanks for being there and writing what you write.
Thank you Sarah, it is good to hear from you. You put into finely crafted words the thoughts that have been spinning in my head, the last several weeks, which seem like years. How devastating it must be to have emerged into adulthood after 9/11, after the Iraq war, after the 2008 meltdown, after the disappointing Obama years only to be followed by MAGA. As for Kamala, she will go only so far, the super rich will see to that. Anything but Trump. From my own perspective , our downward spiral has been evident since the JFK assassination and it may not be stopped, only delayed. There I go being pessimistic again.
I’ve read your books, Sarah, and you’ve taught and enlightened me so much and I truly appreciate it. And it’s why I’m an avid reader of your Substack. I’m a boomer and was an adult during the Nixon and Reagan years. I lived in NYC on 9/11 and protested hard against getting into Afghanistan and Iraq. I’ve seen the Tea Party evolve in terrible ways. And as a NYer I was bombarded daily with Trump’s immoral, illegal, disgusting antics and NEVER expected him to become president. I’ve always wanted my country to be better, but I’ve also been realistic that I’ll never see the end of the evils of dark money, corporations and transnational crime in my lifetime. But I DO believe there’s a difference between the parties and the Ds for sure are the lesser of 2 evils. And that’s ok. I think Obama was better than Bush and Biden is better than Trump (duh) and I’ll happily vote for Harris. About her policies: I believe she’ll get more in the weeds after the convention but are the D and R policies they spout every 4 years really any different than they’ve been for decades? (And no, I don’t believe that they’re the same.) Hillary Clinton was a policy wonk and nobody really paid attention. Harris has already been part of an administration that has done good things (yes, despite not getting everything we did get some good things). And the Israel/U.S. relationship can not be overturned in 4 years, or ever. (Of course that’s a much greater conversation to be had.) We can’t throw the baby out with the bath water. I guess my overall point is that I don’t share (what as I perceive as) your hopelessness. At this moment I hold on to hope that Trump will be defeated. Do I think Harris will be a transformational president? Not really. I’ve never seen a truly transformational president but one that offers some hope rather than a dystopian, evil view is what we need at this moment. I’ll continue to happily endorse her and then hold her accountable as I’ve done for all the other presidents I’ve seen.
Most people (Americans) won't understand you and what you have written here. And yet you keep on. This perseverance is why for years I have admired you. You are uncompromising.
For years you and I have met, from Twitter to Substack. I've recently called you my queen, but that's just my way of showing you my respect; doesn't mean anything.
I’m new to this substack. This stuff is bracing, but it makes something resonate in me like a piano string. Obama’s presidency was aesthetically satisfying after the idiocy of Bush, but does anyone else remember the depressing tepidness of what we were offered at a time when we had SIXTY Democratic senators?
Yes, the Biden presidency is deeply compromised, but the madness of the Republicans might finally have allowed Democrats to shift the window back just a bit. Why compromise with lunatics?
Anyway … thanks, Sarah Kendzior for some unvarnished truth.
Thank you! And yes, I remember the disappointment of Obama's early years but I didn't understand it fully until later. What blows my mind now is the way the much more recent progressive Biden 2020 platform has been forgotten, as if it never existed, along with the Dems having the presidency, house, senate, and general approval of the US public for two years while barely trying to enact the policies they ran on
I'll never forgive Biden for lying about the Build Back Better bill. He told the progressives they had to split it up so they could pass infrastructure; then he said he wouldn't sign one bill without the other. Well, that's exactly what he did. The BBB had a bunch of nice things for women and children😞
I'm amazed at the ignorance of so many of these comments. I understand that you are young, but before giving an opinion, study history and more recent events. You are Disappointed in Obama for not instantly fixing the worst economic crash since the Republican Great Depression of 1929? The economic destruction which was caused by three decades of republican policies. Why don't you remember how the minority republicans were able to bring Congress to a halt thanks to Mitch McConnell using THE FILIBUSTER to stop any Democratic legislation! The republican minority screwed the American people by deliberately slowing our recovery; they even voted against a jobs bill which they had once supported. Just to screw Obama. STUDY MORE !
Who is young? The author of the article who has earned a PhD in a field of study that is quite germane to the current political environment in America? Whatever the case, you sound arrogant. You reveal your allegiance in the way you articulate your disdain for Republicans while willfully ignoring many justifiable criticisms of the Democrats. Lewis Black famously described the Democratic Party as the party of bad ideas and the Republican Party as the party of no ideas. He has yet to be proven wrong. And because he has not been proven wrong is a big part of the reason a lifelong fraud has a chance of winning a second term. Both parties are self-serving malignancies killing their host.
Young, hahaha! I earned that PhD while raising a baby who is now seventeen years old. This lady’s comments remind me of my husband putting “29” on my birthday cake as a joke for a decade and a half ;) Only she’s serious!
I do wish people would read the sections of my articles on political cults more closely…
Anyway I agree with most of what you’re saying here, except that the Dems sometimes have good ideas — which is why it’s so sad that most do not attempt to act on those ideas or fight for their constituents. Also the GOP does have ideas — terrible ideas, over 900 pages of them! But I’m with you on the “self serving malignancies killing their hosts” — that is indeed the end result.
Fair enough. I remain confused by so many things regarding Democratic strategy. In my judgment, the Dems continue to fail to read the room and truly understand why the Republican nominee exists. I always enjoy your writing; thank you for sharing it.
This reminds me of Brexit. Throughout negotiations the UK refused to accept that the EU worked the way it worked.
Trade experts have posted that they've held countless briefings with ministers and members of parliament of both parties informing them of how EU trade procedures work with non-members and what was possible outside of the EU Single Market (which had eliminated all goods border controls) They didn't want to know.
Eight years later they still don't! In consequence the UK trade border
for goods coming from the EU is still porous because they daren't apply full checks lest the delays created slow down food and vital goods. On top of that they didn't bother building adequate facilities (unlike on the EU side) or training anything like the number of customs staff required.
It isn't incompetence it's wilful.
Politicians have so many expert resources a letter or a phone call away.
If they personally can't read the room you betcha there are consultants out there that can advise them.
They haven't wanted to read the room.
Miss* I'm fucking 35 and I've seen 20 years of this shit.
Apologies for previous misgendering you, it was fully unintended.
Let me, please, correct the misimpression that Obama ever had a working 60-vote majority in the Senate.
Sen. Ted Kennedy, dying of a brain tumor, cast his last vote in the Senate in March 2009. He was too ill thereafter to do so, although he didn't die until late summer. The 60th Democrat, Al Franken of Minnesota, wasn't sworn in until almost four months after Kennedy's last vote. So Obama never had a working, filibuster-proof majority.
You can criticize Obama for a number of things that he did or failed to do, but "failing to act on a filibuster-proof majority" is not one of them.
Thank you for reminding us of this timeline. I supported Al Franken and remember he recount challenge very well. I donated to the recount campaign and got to meet Franken twice as a result.... the second time in D.C. when he celebrated his success. The time it took made Obama's job harder... but what also mad it harder (and make me angry to this day) is how Franken was kicked out of the Senate by his fellow Democrats (especially a female Senator whose name I will not mention) all because of a stupid photograph taken during a USO tour! Talk about the Democrats shooting themselves in the foot! The party disgusts me when it does stuff like this. SMH
That's not what happened to Franken, but both Cuomo and Franken have so many apologists, I'd never be able to count them all. Anyway, please read more about Franken before you decide. 8 women had claims - it wasn't a photo. https://abcnews.go.com/US/sen-al-frankens-accusers-accusations-made/story?id=51406862
Ok how’s this? Obama was a terrible negotiator who negotiated himself down from the public option and other policies where he limited his negotiating position before the talks even started. McConnell ate him for breakfast… And we ended up with an incrementalist President who didn’t accomplish nearly as much as he might have.
OK, granted, I'd remembered that Franken's seating in the Senate was delayed forever, but had forgotten that Ted Kennedy had died before he was seated.
But the Dems did have enough votes to repeal or limit the stupid filibuster. (I've had it with Democrats being institutionalists while the Republicans are setting fire to literally everything. As if the GOP would maintain the filibuster for 30 seconds more than was convenient for them.) And they should have done it to pass any number of important and impactful pieces of legislation.
I think the fair critique of government is that has done nothing impactful for decades on any of the major issues of the day (except the ACA), in spite of broad consensus on these policies: immigration, affordable housing, gun violence, real and immediate climate action, democracy protection and expansion. And there are so many other ways that the government could affect real and lasting change: mass transit, food policy,. I can't think of most of it because my view of government has become increasingly cramped over the 44 years since Reagan.
If Democrats can't finally make a full-throated defense of government as a force for good, well, we deserve what we get.
Kennedy didn't die before Franken was seated, but he had become too ill by then to make it to the Senate for votes.
I agree with some of your other points, however. Most Dem congresscritters have to be pushed kicking and screaming, in the midst of a crisis, and with the exception of the ACA, absent a crisis, they don't act.
That said, the Senate is now institutionally stacked against a Dem filibuster-proof majority -- states get two senators irrespective of size, so it's possible for 51 senators representing < 40% of the country's population to enact policy. So if Dems are going to get anything done, they must not only hold the WH, House, and Senate at once, they're going to have to kill the filibuster, at least for certain urgent bills.
A lot of Democrats will say, "We shouldn't do that because that's what the Republicans would do!" To which I would reply, "Have you not been paying attention to the GOP for the past 30 years? If the GOP grabs the Senate this fall, killing the filibuster is what they are GOING to do."
This deserves a follow.
Obama's administration was shackled by Mitch McConnell, who determined from day one to undermine and block anything Obama attempted. How did he know he could do this, with the Democrats in control of congress? THE FILIBUSTER. He used it as the ultimate weapon. And he was very successful at it. He had republicans vote against the interest of the people, just to weaken Obama. The republicans cared nothing for us, despite us suffering through the worst economic crisis since the Republican Great Depression of 1929. Before opining on Obama's 'failures', learn more about the situation.
Maybe you wrote this article before Kamala outlined her policies, but she has in fact enunciated several economic policies:
Food prices
After years of polling showing that Americans are worried about inflation, Harris is aiming to contain prices where they have often been most conspicuously felt — at the grocery store. She’s promising to, during her first 100 days in office, send Congress proposed federal limits on price increases for food producers and grocers. Harris also is seeking new authority for the Federal Trade Commission and attorneys general in states across the country to enact steeper punishments for violators. She also wants to use government regulators to crack down on mergers and acquisitions among large food industry businesses that the vice president argues have contributed to higher prices.
Housing
Harris is calling for the construction of 3 million new housing units over four years, which she says will ease a “serious housing shortage in America.” She also plans to promote legislation creating a new series of tax incentives for builders who construct “starter” homes sold to first-time homebuyers.
She also wants a $40 billion innovation fund — doubling a similar pot of money created by the Biden administration — for businesses building affordable rental housing units. Harris also wants to speed up permitting and review processes to get housing stock to the market more quickly.
WATCH: Why lower-income renters in Austin are struggling to find affordable housing
Harris further says she can lower rental costs by limiting investors who buy up homes in bulk, as well as curbing the use of price-setting tools that she argues encourage collusion to increase profits among landlords. She also wants to expand a Biden administration plan providing $25,000 in potential down payment assistance to help some renters buy a home, so that it will include a much larger swath of first-time home buyers across the country.
The vice president also has endorsed repurposing some federal land to make room for new affordable housing, an idea that Biden endorsed while still running for president and that Trump has also spoken about favorably.
Taxes and medical costs
Harris wants to speed up a Biden administration effort that has allowed Medicare and other federal programs to negotiate with drugmakers to lower the cost of prescription medications, aiming to cut the price tags of some of the most expensive and most commonly used drugs by roughly 40 percent to 80 percent starting in 2026. She’s also promised to promote competition with steps to increase transparency within pharmaceutical company pricing practices.
READ MORE: FDA says Florida can import prescription drugs from Canada
Harris also pledged to work with state entities to cancel $7 billion of medical debt for up to 3 million qualifying Americans.
The vice president also proposed to make permanent a $3,600 per child tax credit approved through 2025 for eligible families, while offering a new $6,000 tax credit for those with newborn children. She says a Harris administration would work to expand the Earned Income Tax Credit to cut taxes for some frontline workers by up to $1,500 and reduce taxes on healthcare plans offered on the marketplace created by the Affordable Care Act.
[Source: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/harris-has-proposed-a-slew-of-economic-policies-heres-a-look-at-whats-in-them]
I remember Biden promising to pull out all the stops to battle COVID in honor of his deceased son Beau, who would have died from COVID during cancer treatment. Instead, Biden prematurely declared the pandemic over. We are now entering the fifth school year of the COvID pandemic with cases surging and mask bans passing as “public safety” measures.
My trust in these promises from the Harris campaign is at rock bottom.
Yes, Biden's covid policy is one of the worst things he's done. It was when I began to sharply lose trust in the administration, and it coincided with it becoming obvious that Garland's DOJ was not going to punish any of the leading seditionists, mafiosos, or Trump. This all happened at once around May 2021. I'd really love to see a tell-all on the CDC under both Trump and Biden, because it's just criminal. I know people who got long covid and one who died because they believed they were safe with the vaccines and should no longer mask; they never thought Biden would just lie to them like that and had considered the CDC to be a dependable, scientifically based organization.
Your writing and analysis really is remarkable. And the way you weave in personal anecdotes without losing the big picture.
Have you written or do you plan to write anything digging more into the COVID policy stuff? I think this is an especially complex and fraught topic (I realize they all are, but some like Gaza actually seem quite straightforward to me). What bothered me most about Biden's policy has much less to do with easing of official restrictions (especially since Omicron) than the withdrawal of funding and support for infrastructure like testing, medical staffing and resources, ventilation standards, safety nets and sick leave for those impacted, research on Long COVID, and future pandemic preparedness. And as you say, generally pretending it was no longer a pressing concern, just because more than 50% of the population would be OK with that. And all the lying. Ironically, many still accused the administration as too strict or alarmist because of all the offloading of responsibility onto individuals, when they probably would support the kind of long-term social investments that really matter.
I think you can fall on the side of repealing half-assed mask mandates and reopening schools, and yet continue to treat COVID as a very serious priority in every other respect.
I may write about it more but I’m not an epidemiologist so I feel hesitant diving into the science. However I do know when people are being lied to and screwed over and that one of the leading indicators of a fledgling autocracy is the erasure of public health data from public view. I did write about covid in my book THEY KNEW but it was more about official responsibility and betrayal of the public. It’s incredibly frustrating to me that there is not money for free testing, healthcare, treatment for long covid, research on long covid, *ventilation upgrades in schools* and many other things they could go to mitigate this. I’m just glad I don’t live on Long Island where they banned masks. I’m worried they’ll ban them in NYC next and I worry about all the people there with cancer or other diseases that render covid extremely deadly, both the New Yorkers living there and those coming to places like Sloan Kettering where everyone should be masking up.
If the mask ban comes to Nashville I won't be able to leave my home! 21 months of Long Covid and I mask everywhere! To his credit Bernie Sanders has released a Long Covid Moonshot Legislative proposal. We'll see if it flies~~~
Thanks for all these thoughts. Yes, availability/transparency of data is so key; meant to list that too as part of infrastructure. The mask bans....wow.
Like the live streamed genocide in Palestine, the issue of COVID is billed as “complex” when it’s not. We knew from the outset that COVID was a novel virus. Biden’s policy is eugenicist. Kill and further maim the medically vulnerable and disabled that need to access healthcare in now unmasked medical facilities. Tell “healthy” people they can handle the virus and let them roll the dice with long COVID, only to find out once they are “unlucky” that they have few to no treatment options. It’s not complicated. Masks work. Vaccines reduce disease severity. Air filtration reduces transmission.
Completely agree about the lying and downplaying. I guess I was thinking more of the complexities around how the public has made sense of COVID in particular, and various responses to it. But maybe you're right that it's not so different.
I don’t want Trump and I would like to see a woman be President but the only one that’s going to save us and the planet is us.
Yes, it’s going to take electing her and continuing to fight for changes that we need.
Yeah, about that. She's a staunch supporter of Israel's right to defend itself and she will continue the genocide. That's a red line for me. Good to know it's not one for you.
Just a reminder... if we don't preserve democracy by rejecting Trump / fascism... we will never be able to change our position towards Israel. Trump and Netanyahu are both cut from the same clothe. Just my 2 cents.
Bless your heart🤣
We don't live in a democracy🤣😂🤣
Genocide is a red line for me. I wouldn't let Kamala watch my child, so I'm certainly not going to vote for someone who's going to assist in the slaughter of children. How do you sleep at night?
Thanks for asking. I sleep at night knowing I still live in a country where I have the freedom to think what I want to think and vote for who I want to vote for... just like you are free to say you would not "let Kamala watch my child".
And thank you for blessing my heart. We will have to agree to disagree regarding whether we currently live in a democracy or not... another thing we still have the freedom to do.
God bless you and your ability to choose what you think and say.
Anyone remember 'the excess profits tax' Not the ones from 1863, 1917 or 1933? I remember one in 1991, about Oil.
Certainly a gauntlet of progressive programs to capture the eye and ear. Maybe you could fill in some blanks on just one of them, 3 million new affordable homes?
Given federal land might be brought into play to allow for that, you will need new roads and basic infrastructure like water, electric and sewer to start.
Who is going to build these homes? Most companies of scale already have considerable obligation.
How are you going to generate the materials required like concrete, lumber, drywall, electric, plumbing, roofing, etc from industry that struggles to accommodate current demand?
And mostly, where does the manpower come from? Currently we have less than four percent unemployed and most of those completely unqualified or unwilling to do a construction trade or manual labor.
Maybe you’ve figured it out but to me it looks like a pipe dream that even in the best scenario would take a decade or more to realize. At best I think you could produce a couple hundred thousand homes in four years.
What say you?
There is no way in hell Kamala will use price controls on flour, cooking oil, and eggs. We know this because Kamala didn't speak in specifics and didn't talk about bringing back the grain reserves and other food reserves, or about the USDA Commodities program. Even if she did I would not trust her.
Those are all wonderful in theory, but even one of the "simplest" ones - floated by Biden in fact - about limiting the rate at which rental prices can go up is systemically painful to even implement.
How are you going to limit rental prices from going up if you don't have a history of those prices?
Is this based on the market, or individual rentals? Who submits data and is it mandatory?
Who tracks data and handles landlords who break the nonexistant-law?
How long does it take to arbitrate?
Do you mean increases to an existing rental agreement, or do you mean the rental price on the market, period? Because landlords were already circumventing the former by just cancelling leases unilaterally and demanding a new lease agreement signed under the new, jacked up price.
Would that be state or federal?
How does any of the above mesh with the recent decisions in the Circuit and Supreme courts that undermine the Government's ability to delegate things to the alphabet agencies?
We aren't Trump voters, we actually expect realistic goals with trackable deliverables.
Thank you for this. I was wondering if Sarah wrote her essay before Kamala Harris gave her economic speech too.
I wish someone would take Senator Warren’s 2020 presidential platform and run on that. It really disgusted me when people mocked her for “having plans” because everybody else is running on an autopilot to nowhere. Thanks for your insight, as always, Sarah!
Yes I liked Warren’s plans! I was glad she had plans even if I sometimes disagreed with the content. It’s honestly hard for me to come up with candidates who didn’t have plans during that primary. It was a baseline expectation. Bernie had plans and a philosophy, Buttigieg had plans that kept morphing according to consultants but at least they were plans, Castro (underrated candidate) had plans. I’m trying to figure out when Americans let go of the basic expectation of their leaders having plans and I think it was when the Biden admin failed to enact any of the most basic plans, in particular protecting people from Covid and holding Trump and his cohort accountable for their crimes.
Too many political candidates run for election without plans , platforms , or even a glimmer of an original idea . Too many voters don’t seem to be bothered about it . So , when a candidate has plans , they are often mocked - much like Sen. Warren . Our Presidential Debates have completely devolved into middle school bullying : no policy agenda will cross their lips , because the audience and media is looking for ‘hits’ ,not substance .
With such a flawed political system that we have ( I’m trying to always remind myself that it’s only ever been an Experiment ) , we can only hope that our fellow voters can choose wisely , and that we thankfully still have the right to vote .
Senator Warren's plan was actual work. Every one in every corner of the sustem would have had to show up to do the work. Showing off would have had to be the thankless victory lap of being satisfied that you did your best. Not performative puffing.
At a minimum, I'm hoping that federal agencies remain ungutted, and that we at the local level can quietly get on with creating a better world.
I loved "long-lost fiends," accidental or not!
Haha -- totally accidental, but since there were indeed fiends, I am keeping it
It’s a holdover from your Best Fiends ads in the podcast! 🤣
Oh god that was such a nightmare...I'm so glad I don't have to do that anymore!
Hahaha!
I already know how I intend to vote for president. That doesn't make me a Harris cultist. She has said she will have a news conference, a one-on-one sitdown interview with a major journalist, or both between the end of the convention this week and the end of the month. That's soon enough for me.
It's not as if we don't know ANYTHING about Harris. We know what she ran on in 2020. We know of at least some places where she may deviate from Biden's positions. We don't know everything, but we know enough to know that she is far preferable to Donald Trump -- and far more likely to be responsive to persuasion from the public after she is inaugurated than Trump is.
No, that's not great, but until Jan. 21, I'll take it. Then will be soon enough to start calling her to account for the positions with which we disagree.
Is it reasonable to say that we have to save our democracy before we can fix it?
I would say so in this particular instance (I don't know if that's true as a general trend). I don't see a path by which any action other than voting for Harris (or, God forbid, whoever the Dem nominee is if for any reason she can't see it through) takes us to a better democracy.
We know that she fully supports the genocide but I don’t see how she is far preferable to Trump, marginally at best. I understand that not everyone voting for her is a Kamala cultist, but if you vote for her while disagreeing with the genocide; what does that say about your expectations of her? I understand the lesser of two evils but that doesn’t soothes me morally and recent history shows that it doesn’t work, it slows down the autocratic decline at best. Once elected will you have zero leverage.
I know of no evidence that she "fully supports" the genocide, and I think we've got a lot better chance of stopping it with her as president than with Trump as president. A LOT better. Bibi pulling for Trump should tell you all you need to know.
What it says about my expectations of her is this: I'm 64 freakin' years old, and I spent almost 30 years covering elections. I am absolutely realistic about them, even as I rage sometimes that we don't have better candidates. Two things can be true at once: Harris can be deeply flawed and still FAR better than Trump. The time to go after your perfect candidate is in the primary, and if your candidate doesn't do well in the primary, well, that's how our system works. And, yes, it sucks, but it sucks less than every other system ever devised.
At the moment, slowing down the autocratic decline is the best we can do, so let's unite to DO that and then work toward a time when we can do even more. False equivalence and nihilism, toward which you are trending, will only elect Trump and put us in a fast car on a short, wide road to hell. Actual Holocaust survivors have said so, and I believed them the first time.
She does, if she didn’t she could just say it, it’s not that hard. I read ‘chance’, ‘belief’, no evidence that she’d be significantly better though. Need I mention that there was no ‘primary’. Letting go of the quantitative difference between the two, all I am saying is that it’s not enough for my vote (out of principle and as a message). If she cannot even say that she is against an ongoing genocide, I am not the one being a nihilist, she is, literally.
<<She does, if she didn’t she could just say it, it’s not that hard. I read ‘chance’, ‘belief’, no evidence that she’d be significantly better though.>>
Dude. Have you SEEN Donald Trump?
And she has said she opposes genocide. She just hasn't phrased it exactly as you want it. "If she didn't, she could just say it, it's not that hard" isn't proof in any reputable newsroom in the country.
Here we are: “but Trump” is not an argument, this is the “Hunter Biden’s laptop” of the libs.
I despise Trump as much as the next guy btw.
It’s the burden of proof fallacy, I don’t have to prove that she is supporting genocide, she has to prove to us that she is against it. (Inaction defaults to a support) All the evidence is against her so far. It might be painful to admit but it doesn’t make it less true.
God forbid you ever end up on a jury.
And in an election system in which you have two and only two meaningful choices, "but Trump" is the argument that, forgive me, trumps all others. Arguing otherwise betrays moral stillbirth.
Seriously? No difference? You obviously don’t give a fig about women’s rights or the environment. But hey, if it doesn’t affect you personally, why care about anyone else, amirite?
I’m ok with no primary. Hell, I’m more than ok! Kamala Harris both earned and deserves it. I accept that positive progressive change takes a loooong time to gain popular support across our vast nation (and in turn force the hands with the deep pockets). Dark money is behind both sides, but there are still some fundamentals that the two sides of the coin don’t see eye to eye on. There is the core difference of the repubs losing the thread of actually governing, let alone their stated and expressed goals of imposing the doctrine of white Christian nationalism on the entire populace. These are some of the many reasons I find more compelling differences than similarities between the parties at this juncture in time.
Marginal differences, mostly lip service. I would appreciate you not accusing me without any basis.(I do care very much about everyone’s rights and the climate crisis btw more than Biden apparently) How do you explain my care for Palestinian people then? My argument is not so much ideological here, it’s more on the effectiveness of tactics.
But on care and ideology, I maintain that no issue is more profound and universal than the Palestinian cause. I believe that it is fundamentally connected to most of these issues that we like to see as Trumpian (Racism, misogyny, police state, militarization, autocracy, neoliberalism, climate change…)✌️
I beg to differ that women’s rights and access to abortion in our nation is more than a marginal concern. Regressive right wing policies are having real life and death impact on women and girls throughout the nation. But that’s just my perspective as a woman. I don’t endorse the atrocity that Israel is carrying out in Gaza. As another commenter said, Netanyahu and trump are cut from the same cloth with dictatorial ambitions. I do not believe that of Harris but there’s no denying the fact that wealthy donors behind both parties are the ones actually calling the shots. So I’m not sure it matters what our president thinks about the issue as even the honest ones are ultimately beholden to dark money ever since Citizens United.
Agreed on all points. Not what I said though. I did not call these issues marginal, I called the difference of Dems position/actions towards these said issues marginal. Dems talk about it but don’t deliver. Abortion and its tie to a corrupt SC is case in point (for abortion and else…) what did the Dems do ro remedy that. Impeachment? Increasing the number of Justices? Put it in to law? Nothing. (Fear of failure not being an argument not to try btw) You seem to agree with me that candidates are essentially the same due to the nature of their donors. If we don’t send any electoral signal that we’re not OK with no primary and no genocide, what is next? Open bar: send Manchin or Sinema…
You’re the best. Thank you.
If she can’t agree that genocide, colonization and apartheid are bad (let alone neoliberalism) there is nowhere to go.
No kidding. I don't understand how anyone can back this admin's sadistic policy in Gaza. It's what I want Harris most to change. I nearly brought up what is happening to Palestinian babies in this article since I was writing about the hopes a new parent has for their child -- but it is so dark, it felt tonally appropriate to lump in the horror they endure with my comparatively small complaints. The children of Gaza are in pieces that their parents carry in bags. It's unbearable to even see the images and the agony of Palestinian parents is beyond my comprehension.
Regarding this administration's policy towards Israel... I hope someday a book is written about how Israel managed to gain so much influence over politicians in America. I often read about Putin's influence over the GOP... a relatively recent development all things considered. But Israel's influence over the Democratic Party (and I suppose the GOP too) has existed for a whole lot longer. It's almost as if they have dirt on America's political class... but that's just a wild guess on my part. Whatever the cause, our inability to say no to Israel (and I know the Middle East has oil we want... but come on!) seems to be way out of control and in need of being exposed. All of this is my way of saying I don't blame Biden or Harris. They appear not to have a choice in the matter... as upsetting as that is for me to write.
There are a few good books about the Israeli lobby and US politics, probably the most famous of which is Stephen Walt's -- but his is from 2007. It was published to enormous controversy even though it was meticulously fact-checked. Robert Friedman did some great investigative reporting in the 1990s on the really dark side of US-Israeli politics -- collaborations between the FBI and the JDL/Kahanists. Every book that attempts to cover these topics nowadays gets censored. There was a bit of an open period around 2017-2019 when I managed to get Hiding in Plain Sight out. As you know, that book is about a transnational criminal syndicate and names a large number of countries, but the main three are the US, Russia, and Israel, and it was only with the sections on Israel (and Robert Maxwell/Jeffrey Epstein in particular) that I ran into trouble even though it was all legally vetted and footnoted intensely. The atmosphere is even worse now because there is more self-censorship, a terrible journalism economy, a genuine and awful rise in anti-semitism that makes people understandably wary of broaching the topic, and new laws that restrict speech on Israel being passed in certain institutions and in certain states.
One historical anecdote I would like to see more thoroughly investigated is this claim from Senator Fulbright in 1973: https://www.jta.org/archive/fulbright-israel-controls-senate
Thank you for responding. And please accept my apology regarding you mentioning Israel in "Hiding In Plain Sight". America continues to be a place founded on great principles that were very poorly implemented from the beginning and continue to be only slightly better implemented today (women and Blacks now technically having the right to vote).
I saw a comment recently that said "Given all the shit happening in America, you might think this country was cursed.... almost as if the nation was built on ancient Indian burial grounds!" I almost spit out my coffee when I read that!
Hiding In Plain Sight was the best!
I looked up the Walt book. Were you referring to "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy," by John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt, 2006?
For sure, I loved the article as is. I have been increasingly ashamed of having supported and defended Obama so adamantly for so long, the relatability was quite cathartic.
I recently moved to North Carolina from Texas. Cornell West will be on the ballot here🥳 I'm getting registered to vote her soon.
Am sure what we see is cleansed.
Jeezus, Sarah. You keep reminding me why I have to be straight and not bullshit myself.
Yes, i was getting the kamala vibes for a bit but you remind me to think with care - even though it hurts.
I wanna believe we can get ourselves out of this hellhole of America today!! But hell, I don’t know what America is anymore.
Obama was a charade. He caved and “led from behind” (wtf was that!?) but he did make healthcare possible for some people who couldn’t get it before. Was it worth it ? to put up with all the other BS? The continuation of the forever wars? The ridiculousness of the Eric Holder Attorney General years? JFC! Will we ever have an attorney general who can do anything good goddamnit?
James Carville used to say it’s the economy stupid. But I want to say even louder, it’s the rule of law stupid. We have no damn rule of law in this country and it seems that nobody notices.
Are you the only one talking about this? Anyway. I’m glad I subscribe to this. I appreciate you. Even though it hurts.
Thank you! I look forward to a day when the truths I have to tell are less painful
“The truth will set you free,
but first it will piss you off”
- Gloria Steinem
It’s okay. We gotta deal. We are all in this mess together.
Arne Duncan, former basketballer, as head of Education. Duh!
Rahm Emanuel, repressive Chicago mayor. Duh!
This piece brought back bittersweet memories of my toddler racing around the living room on election night 2008 saying “Ooooobama! Ooooobama!” Crazy to think that a man who we thought would be a transformational political figure now just makes sad girl Spotify playlists for my daughters to laugh at.
It's surreal. Watching his dystopian Netflix movie was particularly unnerving. His presidency meant so much to so many people and it is sad what its legacy is (and like I said, an extremely complicated legacy since he entered office when so many earth-shattering events were converging -- I didn't even list them all because it would have gone on forever)
But yeah, as a kid, my daughter loved him too, and I was so happy back then that he was the first president she would remember, instead of George W Bush, who was POTUS when she was born
Yeah when it came to popularity with preschoolers Obama could hold his own against Cailou, Curious George and Martha Speaks. If only he was equally effective going up against Mitch McConnell and John Boehner…
I remember reading what Michele Obama said, that they had to pitch perfect in ‘everything’ they did. Being the first Black president, every move he made was watched so intently that any move away from so called norms and he would have been buried even more than he was. VP Kamala Harris is tagged as ‘unburdened’ - history teaches so let’s hope she’s learned the lesson.
Your writing makes me often stop to absorb the beauty of your words. At 75, I have a different world view but I appreciate your insightful writing from a different angle. A century’s worth of political events since Trump’s near assassination to today compressed in a few weeks. I hope you continue to write.
Thank you very much, I appreciate that!
Yes, I agree. I have always admired her elegant use of just the right word (hmmm, I wish my keyboard had italics…).
I must now have a think about her view of Obama, which I agree with but rather shamefacedly, because hitherto I had thought I was the only one to hold it…
I’m early GenX so I’ve experienced more-Carter inflation & gas lines. Reagan union busting & welfare queen vilification. Made it to Bill Clinton-then Monica. Obama. Deep breaths. Every day for 8 years I thought he was going be assassinated.
Now we have a staged fake assassination on our hands. Why? Stephen Sondheim teaches us that “Lincoln, who got mixed reviews, because of you John, now gets only raves.” This is a song called Ballad of Booth. Trump definitely trying to gin up polls by this crap.
To your substack: I disagree. The Harris campaign has laid out some of her plans for a Harris Administration. I’m okay with no in depth items. Why? The main stream media will only attack it & spit it out to the general public in sound bites that will never be fact checked. It’s like Trump can’t put a coherent sentence together, forgets what state he’s actually in, & here’s why that’s bad for Kamala Harris. The NYTIMES & WaPo are complicit as are all other news outlets.
The Harris campaign has released some information about plans for voter integrity. It’s being led my Marc Elias, a lawyer. People can google this.
Sarah, I have always loved your writing. I was working at an investment bank in 2008. I was working across the street from the south tower as a plane hit it (I was in the - Deutsche Bank building). I have witnessed catastrophe super close up. The dot com crash? Uh yeah right after college. Carter-Reagan-Bush I-a few ok years-Bush II (hanging chads) then jump off the Verrazano Bridge. Yet here I am. My body is broken. As Sondheim also teaches us, “I’m still here.”
You write as if you’ve lived thru the worst. Girl, no. You have a freaking PhD. I was not afforded that opportunity. No one could help me or would help me with that path. I was fortunate enough to pay my way through undergrad & it was not easy. I’m proud of what I accomplished. I would love to go back to school now. Even CUNY laughs at my butt.
Please do not denigrate Madam Vice President without paying more attention to the clear & present danger of Donald Trump. You write as if sure I would not vote for him & Project 2025 sucks butt yet women may never vote again. I ask you to try to recall how you felt the day Roe v Wade was overturned. Please do remember that Donald Trump has full immunity for prosecution of any crimes he may commit his next term in office.
Have a good night.
I’ll never support corrupt Trump.
Anyone who quotes Sondheim will always have my ear. Sarah has indeed lived through the worst, but only in so far as we ALL have. She uses a personal lens to show us what is happening to us collectively. And rest assured, she knows that Kamala is the best hope we have. Despite a snarky comment below, I don't think you were being hyperbolic about expressing your fears that women could be denied the vote. The GOP is overtly misogynistic--they don't even bother to hide it anymore. A very close relative recently told me I shouldn't have a personal stake in women's reproductive rights because I am now too old to bear children. Under a president Rump, that right to vote could be denied to us all; isn't that what he is telling us? Believe him!! Please keep the faith, and I look forward to checking out her voter integrity plan under Marc Elias. I hadn't yet clocked that.
“Women may never vote again”
If you would drop the ridiculous and offensive hyperbole it would help make you look less insane.
So Scott, in 2016 did you imagine that in a few years we'd be hearing regular stories about women who have pregnancies that are endangering their health being told to wait in their cars in the parking lot of the ER to be nearby when they got close enough to dying to be treated legally? Or 10-year-old rape victims having to travel 1,000 miles in order not to give birth to her rapist's baby? Or women being sent home to miscarry and bleed out on their bathroom floors?
You have a male name so I'll assume you are male (apologies if you are not). You mock the OP's comment but if you're not a woman you can't understand the existential dread women feel at the prospect of another Trump term. Not being allowed to vote sounds ridiculous -- until you think about how quickly we lost the right to bodily autonomy.
Hi Scott:
Did you not hear JD Vance, the Vice Presidential nominee, say that women who don’t have children, “miserable childless cat ladies,” should not be able to vote because they don’t have a stake in the future of our country? He also does not want women in the workplace. Mark Robinson, South Carolina gubernatorial candidate has said he wants to go back to the time women could not vote. These men are not alone in their sentiments. Vance’s biggest donor, Peter Thiel, has also been on the record with these same words about women not voting. It happens slowly then all at once. IJS
Don’t believe everything Joy Reid tells you. She is an unreliable narrator.
I have female MAGA evangelical friends that have been saying for years that women should not vote. Should I believe them when they say it? For sure.
And I know people who think that Democrats are still the party of working people and actually give a fuck about anything other than their 401K balance. You can’t fix stupid. And I therefore refuse to take accountability for the stupid of others.
One of my main focuses has always been on SCOTUS. I remember campaigning for Bill Clinton’s 1st campaign wearing a little silver coat hangar pin: indicative of the fragility of Roe. I’ve always said “the main thing is the Supreme Court !” Of course, no one listened…now they know. Maybe.
Feels like the image consultants, special interest mercenaries, and a generation of brainwashed sleeper cells in the administrative layer of the political class have made the actual business of the people's business a byproduct. A side hustle. The main event has become a simulacrum in which inititatives are festooned with traps and mines, loopholes intentionally engineered to let corrupt officials skim the cream and also get their jollies when ostensibly decent policies devastate our communities.
Yes, agree completely. It’s awful.
I miss your (Sarah's) voice on the Gaslit Nation podcast, which I had subscribed to. I keep putting off subscribing here because I'm a retiree living within my no-longer-employed income and can't afford to support the 8 or 10 substack writers that I would really like to support and subscribe to. So I'll keep dreaming of less expensive subscriptions and maybe eventually break down and subscribe to 1 or 2 more. Thanks for being there and writing what you write.
Thank you for reading! I understand when people can't afford to subscribe. I've been in that position myself. I'm glad you're here!
Thank you Sarah, it is good to hear from you. You put into finely crafted words the thoughts that have been spinning in my head, the last several weeks, which seem like years. How devastating it must be to have emerged into adulthood after 9/11, after the Iraq war, after the 2008 meltdown, after the disappointing Obama years only to be followed by MAGA. As for Kamala, she will go only so far, the super rich will see to that. Anything but Trump. From my own perspective , our downward spiral has been evident since the JFK assassination and it may not be stopped, only delayed. There I go being pessimistic again.
I’ve read your books, Sarah, and you’ve taught and enlightened me so much and I truly appreciate it. And it’s why I’m an avid reader of your Substack. I’m a boomer and was an adult during the Nixon and Reagan years. I lived in NYC on 9/11 and protested hard against getting into Afghanistan and Iraq. I’ve seen the Tea Party evolve in terrible ways. And as a NYer I was bombarded daily with Trump’s immoral, illegal, disgusting antics and NEVER expected him to become president. I’ve always wanted my country to be better, but I’ve also been realistic that I’ll never see the end of the evils of dark money, corporations and transnational crime in my lifetime. But I DO believe there’s a difference between the parties and the Ds for sure are the lesser of 2 evils. And that’s ok. I think Obama was better than Bush and Biden is better than Trump (duh) and I’ll happily vote for Harris. About her policies: I believe she’ll get more in the weeds after the convention but are the D and R policies they spout every 4 years really any different than they’ve been for decades? (And no, I don’t believe that they’re the same.) Hillary Clinton was a policy wonk and nobody really paid attention. Harris has already been part of an administration that has done good things (yes, despite not getting everything we did get some good things). And the Israel/U.S. relationship can not be overturned in 4 years, or ever. (Of course that’s a much greater conversation to be had.) We can’t throw the baby out with the bath water. I guess my overall point is that I don’t share (what as I perceive as) your hopelessness. At this moment I hold on to hope that Trump will be defeated. Do I think Harris will be a transformational president? Not really. I’ve never seen a truly transformational president but one that offers some hope rather than a dystopian, evil view is what we need at this moment. I’ll continue to happily endorse her and then hold her accountable as I’ve done for all the other presidents I’ve seen.
Most people (Americans) won't understand you and what you have written here. And yet you keep on. This perseverance is why for years I have admired you. You are uncompromising.
For years you and I have met, from Twitter to Substack. I've recently called you my queen, but that's just my way of showing you my respect; doesn't mean anything.
Meanwhile, do carry on, my queen
Sarah is my Queen too! :)