Today is a big primary day, and it could perhaps be the most interesting in this year's election calendar. It's not officially "Super Tuesday," but it might at least be considered "Rather Interesting Tuesday." There are multiple close races to watch, there are both ideological battles and personality contests in both parties, and the punditocracy is going to go into high gear afterwards drawing all sorts of conclusions on a nationwide basis (on races that may in fact only be limited to very local issues, or the strengths and weaknesses of individual candidates). So it's going to be a big night, no matter what happens. But everyone should keep in mind that these are just the primaries -- which means a big win for one faction or another tonight might translate into a big loss for the party in November.

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It now looks like tomorrow's Senate primaries in Pennsylvania might just set up a very interesting race in November's general election. Because it is looking like we might wind up with two very passionate and non-conventional "from the people" nominees, one from the left and one from the right. So we will finally get to see a race in a very purple state (which could easily go either way in November) with a contest between a true MAGA and a real progressive, both willing to get down and dirty fighting for what they believe.

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Of all the different types of cycle that exist in politics, the one of overreach and backlash is one of the most interesting. We may be about to see one of these cycles happen in very accelerated fashion (since it usually takes years or even a few subsequent elections to fully materialize), although since we're at the beginning of the cycle it is impossible to now know how it will all play out.

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Donald Trump likes to see himself as a kingmaker in the world of Republican politics. He's got a case to make -- candidates who gain his endorsement can indeed see a surge in support and even go on to win close races -- but he's also nowhere near as powerful as he'd like everyone to think. That was evident in last night's big loss for his chosen candidate in the Nebraska governor's race. Trump endorsed early, he actually rallied in the state for his anointee, and the guy still lost. Trump is facing a few other prominent losses in the weeks to come as well, in both Idaho and Georgia at the very least.

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President Joe Biden has rolled out a new moniker in the political lexicon: "ultra-MAGA." Unfortunately, this is probably a branding misstep, because while it is rather descriptive of the phenomenon Biden is trying to draw attention to (being a fanatical adherent of Donald Trump's "Make America Great Again" philosophy), it seems more like a positive term a supporter would come up with rather than a slur an opponent would use. So far, I haven't seen either Donald Trump or any other Republican fully embrace the term, but it seems like it's only a matter of time before they do.

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The Democratic Party is in the midst of a minor revolution of the scheduling variety. Earlier, they announced that all states wishing to be early-voting states in the 2024 Democratic presidential primary campaign would have to submit applications to the national party -- and that there was no guarantee that the four who had [...]

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Intraparty, Republican-on-Republican violence aside, however, this was really a one-story week in Washington.

That story was the immense scoop of Politico publishing an almost-100-page draft opinion from Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito. This is virtually unheard of -- such a major leak from the Supreme Court. But it's easy to see why someone decided it was time to tell the public what was about to happen.

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It is undisputable that Donald Trump plumbed new depths for what the Republican Party considers "too far" for their own politicians to go. Trump proved that no scandal -- sexual, financial, business-related, personal, factual, political, international interference in American politics, white national, conspiracy theorist, or insurrectionist -- was "too far" for him to go, at least with his own massive and committed base of supporters within the party ranks. Many other Republicans either now in office or running for office have taken this new low standard to heart, as GOP politician after GOP politician is caught in scandals that previously would have forced them to resign or be voted out of office the first chance the voters had. The big unanswered question is whether any standard (no matter how low) even remains within the party for anyone not named "Donald Trump." How far is "too far," these days, for Republicans?

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The very first column I ever wrote (for the Huffington Post, I didn't actually start this blog until a year later) was titled "Democratic Demagoguery." It urged Democrats to take a page from the Republican playbook and learn how to viscerally present issues and their party's agenda, in order to get more voters to vote for them. It started off (you'll soon note that this was 2006, as some of the current "hot button" issues plainly show) with the following:

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Supreme Courts are commonly referred to using the name of the chief justice who runs them. In my own lifetime, we've had the Warren Court, the Burger Court, the Rehnquist Court, and now the Roberts Court, led by Chief Justice John Roberts. The chief justice is not selected or elected by the other justices, it is a permanent position that only changes after the death or retirement of the previous holder of the title. But it is becoming increasingly obvious (and will continue to become so) that the current court is no longer being led by Roberts. We might as well just adjust to the new reality and start calling it the Alito Court instead.

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