We've all already seen this movie once, so we should kind of know what to expect. And sequels are usually much worse than the original.

Which is why today we're going to devote this column to pondering how bad things could really get in Donald Trump's second term in office (rather than sticking to our normal Friday format). Some things will probably not be as horrifically bad as Democrats now think, some things will indeed be precisely that bad, and some things will be even more horrific than anyone's imagining right now. And my apologies, because this is not an attempt at making a comprehensive list of predictions but rather just free association, what might be called initial thoughts.

Read Complete Article »

Since we are less than three weeks away from the election, we are going to diverge from our normal Friday Talking Points format today.

Instead of brief talking points at the end, instead we tried to make the case against electing Donald Trump in the most effective ways we could think up. But when we got done, we realized that this extended rant also served as a good round-up of the week's political news. Sure, there were a few other things going on in politics, but at this point we are so focused on the campaign and the election that anything else is really just a distraction, this close to Election Day.

Read Complete Article »

The Republican Party is now allergic to the truth. This is what comes from the entire party following, with slavish devotion, a man who lies as easily as he breathes. When Donald Trump was president, the Washington Post counted up over 30,000 lies he told -- an average of 21 per day. Since then, Trump has successfully purged the party of pretty much everyone who has ever disagreed with him on any of them. All that are left are those that are willing to buy into the mindset that reality is what Donald Trump says it is, period. Democrats have been wishing for a while that the Republicans would all wake up one day and return to sanity, but now it's more of a wish that they return to some sort of objective reality -- rather than the Trumpian fantasyland they all now inhabit.

Read Complete Article »

There were two major events in the presidential race this week, but we are left wondering if either one of them is going to make much of a difference one way or the other. Perhaps we're getting a bit jaded by it all....

The first was the one-and-only vice-presidential debate, held on CBS this Tuesday. Republican JD Vance faced off with Democrat Tim Walz, and it was watched by 43 million people as it aired. The second was the public release of a document prosecutor Jack Smith had previously filed with the court in Donald Trump's January 6th case. It laid out Smith's basic case, in great detail (165 pages' worth).

In a normal campaign season, either one of these would have been impactful, perhaps shifting the polling in significant ways. But in our hunkered-down tribalistic politics, the needle barely quivered. Maybe we're all getting a bit jaded?

There were two other rather large events that could affect politics this week: the massive damage Hurricane Helene did -- especially in the Appalachian Mountain region -- and an East Coast dockworkers' strike. The first shouldn't really have been political, and the second was over almost before anyone was aware it was happening.

Read Complete Article »

This week, millions of Americans tuned in to politics only to make an astonishing discovery: Donald Trump is still exactly who he always was! He opens his mouth, and lies and crazy talk pour forth. Same as it ever was... what a surprise!

Now, normal people can be excused for being surprised that Trump is still Trump. Most people have lives to lead and plenty of other things to do, so they simply don't pay much attention to politics. But tens of millions of them made the time this week to tune in to the first debate between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. And it was like going to a family Thanksgiving dinner and once again having to put up with your crazy uncle -- because you had somehow forgotten just how bad he truly was. And still is.

Read Complete Article »

It has now been announced that CNN's Dana Bash has won the journalistic sweepstakes and will be conducting a joint interview with Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz on Thursday. This will fulfill a promise Harris made to sit down for an unscripted interview with the media before the end of the month.

Which directly leads to the question of what Harris and Walz should be asked about on Tuesday. So putting on our late-summer "If It Was Me" thinking cap, here are the questions I would ask Harris and Walz, if they were sitting down with me for an interview.

Read Complete Article »

The Democratic National Convention has truly been a blowout affair, building each day to an even-more-impressive frenzy, sparked by speaker after enthusiastic speaker, each seeming to bring the levels of excitement inside the arena to new heights. Last night was a continuation of this building sense of joy. A third Democratic president, Bill Clinton, appeared (following Joe Biden on the first night and Barack Obama on the second) -- but (rather astonishingly) he was actually not the biggest star of the evening.

Read Complete Article »

You may not have seen Minnesota Governor Tim Walz in action yet. This is understandable, since it was only yesterday that he was named to the Democratic ticket as the vice-presidential nominee. But even if you haven't seen any clips of him yet or watched that blowout Philadelphia rally yesterday, don't worry -- you already know him.

Read Complete Article »

President Joe Biden has had to walk a tightrope on the subject of immigration during his term in office. He has supported programs that were a holdover from the administration of Donald Trump, and just recently announced a tightening of the rules on claiming asylum at the border in an effort to slow the flow of people making such claims. Neither one of these policies went over very well with the progressives in his own party, but this week Biden shifted gears and announced a policy that will benefit the lives of approximately 500,000 people. Undocumented spouses of America citizens who have lived in the country for 10 years or more will have a much easier path to citizenship under Biden's new program. Politically, this may provide a balance to Biden's more restrictive moves on immigration.

Read Complete Article »

Two weeks from tomorrow, CNN will host the first general election presidential debate of the 2024 cycle. This is unprecedented, because it will happen so early in the campaign season. In fact, neither person on stage will officially be their party's nominee at this point, since the conventions will happen afterwards. It will be "Presumptive Republican Nominee Donald Trump" versus "Presumptive Democratic Nominee President Joe Biden." That alone sets it off from every other televised presidential debate.

Read Complete Article »