Finally, a truly massive amount of election fraud has been uncovered! You'd think all of the blind adherents to Donald Trump's Big Lie conspiracy theory would be overjoyed, but that's likely not going to be the case. Because -- as has indeed happened repeatedly in the recent past -- the exposed fraud was intended to benefit Republicans. Strange how this all seems more and more like just a massive case of projection, eh?

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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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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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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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Utah Democrats have just announced they're going to try an experiment. Instead of running a Democratic candidate in the upcoming Senate race, they are instead throwing their weight behind an Independent candidate, Evan McMullin. By doing so, they hope to boost his chances over the incumbent Republican Mike Lee. This is an experiment, so there's no guarantee it'll work -- but it undoubtedly will give McMullin a much better chance at beating Lee, so it will be very interesting to see play out.

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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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There are two major political storms on the horizon that will both break long before the midterm congressional elections, but as it looks now there is one overriding issue in domestic politics that will likely be one of the core issues in the race no matter what. Yes, it's time once again to dust off the 30-year old quip from James Carville: "It's the economy, stupid." This time around, it could be narrowed to: "It's the inflation, stupid."

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