Last week, America experienced a racist extremist shooting up a grocery store, in an effort to kill as many Black people as he could. This week, America had to once again watch as innocent schoolchildren age 10 or under were massacred for no reason whatsoever. This is who we are, and it is shameful.

It is not, however, who we want to be. The public wants more and tighter gun safety laws, by an overwhelming margin. But even in the wake of the horrors of yet another slaughter of innocents, most people who follow politics don't expect much of anything to change. No new laws will pass the Senate, or if something does manage to be worked out, it will be weak and watered-down and likely ineffective at stopping such outrages from regularly happening.

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We were reminded of the whole Wonderful Wizard of Oz metaphor early this week, when we saw Mehmet "Dr." Oz at a last-minute Pennsylvania campaign rally, holding up his smartphone to the crowd, as the disembodied voice of the great MAGA Dear Leader bellowed forth bombast and nonsense to the crowd. All it needed was some smoke and fireballs at the sides of the stage, really. It seemed to us (but then we do have a rather warped sense of humor...) that Oz was begging the crowd to please pay lots of attention to the man behind the curtain.

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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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As we write this, everyone inside the Beltway is getting ready for the upcoming White House Correspondents' Dinner, which President Joe Biden has said he will be attending (after a hiatus of presidents attending due to COVID and, earlier, due to Donald Trump having incredibly thin skin). But, as usual, our invitation seems to have been lost in the mail or something. Ahem.

We are excited with a sort of "something good is about to happen" feeling, however, because the House Select January 6th Committee has finally announced a preliminary schedule for public hearings. Here's the story (as it stands so far):

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If Republicans do take control of both chambers of Congress, the margin of control in each will be the most important variable. In the Senate, the margin will likely be fairly close, but nobody really knows what it might be like in the House. If Republicans have a blowout House election season and pick up dozens and dozens of seats, this will almost certainly make Kevin McCarthy's job a lot easier; but if the margin is tight (maybe not quite as tight as the one Nancy Pelosi has been dealing with, but perhaps within 10 or 15 votes) then any faction bigger than the margin will be able to dictate its own terms -- as the Tea Partiers proved, the last time this happened.

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As distasteful as it may be, it seems like a good time to consider what divided government next year would look like, and what might happen in such a scenario. Of course, nobody knows what the outcome of the midterm congressional election will be, and as Ukraine should have taught us, sometimes crises pop up that aren't a part of the American political cycle at all. So we have no idea right now what the most important issue facing the voters will be in November. It could very well be something that isn't even on anyone's radar at the current moment. But just for the sake of argument, let's assume that Republicans win control back of both the House and the Senate. This would give President Joe Biden a hostile Congress for the remaining two years of his first term.

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President Joe Biden seems to be getting more engaged in the process of the midterm election campaign of late. He has been travelling around the country a lot more (partly this is due to the fluctuating state of the COVID pandemic, of course), he has been making the case for his own record of accomplishments a lot better, and he now seems to be openly considering making a dramatic move that he has actually supported all along: forgiving at least $10,000 of student debt. Notably, this comes only days after Senator Elizabeth Warren publicly urged Biden to start using executive orders to get some things done now, while it could matter for the party's chances in the fall. Maybe Biden got the message.

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Happy Earth Day, everyone!

It's been a rather bizarre week, which is even more odd since Congress is still off lollygagging, rather than doing the people's business as they are handsomely paid to do. Perhaps all these vacations have a cost? That's what we were thinking, at any rate, when we heard the news today that the House Select Committee on January 6th has punted the ball yet again, and will not even be scheduling public hearings until June, rather than next month. Seriously, guys? You're going to break the biggest political scandal story of the year right at the start of summer?!?

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Donald Trump has taught the Republican Party many things that have directly conflicted with long-standing party orthodoxy, so it shouldn't really come as that big a surprise that Republicans are now embracing using the power of government to punish corporate behavior they don't approve of. This is the party formerly known as the champion of the free market, mind you. The party that fought hard for corporations to be considered citizens with full constitutional rights, including the right of "free speech." All of those ideals have been conveniently tossed on the ideological scrap heap, though, as Republicans now fully embrace using the full power of government to punish corporations for speaking out on politics.

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Yesterday I wrote in support of what Senator Elizabeth Warren is calling on her fellow Democrats to do (essentially: pass whatever Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema can agree to, and get Biden to issue a few impactful executive orders). Today I thought taking a look at what Democrats should be saying about their opponents would be a good follow-up, as the midterm campaign season heats up.

This could always change, of course, but right now the smart bet would be to paint the entire Republican Party with the brush that Senator Rick Scott -- the man in charge of the Senate caucus tasked with getting more Republicans elected -- has so helpfully provided. This effort has already begun, and it hopefully will grow a lot bigger over time. Because for once, the path forward for Democratic messaging is about as clear as it can be.

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