David Frum: Only the GOP Celebrates Political Violence

There’s nothing partisan about political violence in America… But if both Republicans and Democrats, left and right, suffer political violence, the same cannot be said of those who celebrate political violence. That’s not a ‘both sides’ affair in 2020s America.

You don’t see Democratic House members wielding weapons in videos and threatening to shoot candidates who want to cut capital-gains taxes or slow the growth of Medicare. Democratic candidates for Senate do not post video fantasies of hunting and executing political rivals, or of using a firearm to discipline their children’s romantic partners. It’s not because of Democratic members that Speaker Nancy Pelosi installed metal detectors to bar firearms from the floor of the House. No Democratic equivalent exists of Donald Trump, who regularly praises and encourages violence as a normal tool of politics, most recently against his own party’s Senate leader, Mitch McConnell. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/10/pelosi-republicans-partisan-political-violence/671934/

Nilay Patel: Welcome to hell, Elon

You fucked up real good, kiddo.

Twitter is a disaster clown car company that is successful despite itself, and there is no possible way to grow users and revenue without making a series of enormous compromises that will ultimately destroy your reputation and possibly cause grievous damage to your other companies.

I say this with utter confidence because the problems with Twitter are not engineering problems. They are political problems. Twitter, the company, makes very little interesting technology; the tech stack is not the valuable asset. The asset is the user base: hopelessly addicted politicians, reporters, celebrities, and other people who should know better but keep posting anyway. You! You, Elon Musk, are addicted to Twitter. You’re the asset. You just bought yourself for $44 billion dollars.

The problem when the asset is people is that people are intensely complicated, and trying to regulate how people behave is historically a miserable experience, especially when that authority is vested in a single powerful individual.

What I mean is that you are now the King of Twitter, and people think that you, personally, are responsible for everything that happens on Twitter now. It also turns out that absolute monarchs usually get murdered when shit goes sideways. https://www.theverge.com/2022/10/28/23428132/elon-musk-twitter-acquisition-problems-speech-moderation

Lara Korte: Why Gavin Newsom isn't even bothering to campaign for reelection

Gavin Newsom is not asking for your vote. He doesn’t need it.

Sliding into a second term might be good for Newsom, but it could be bad for the party. The lack of a competitive race at the top of the ticket could mean low turnout — an unwelcome prospect for Democrats running in critical, closely-contested congressional races in Orange County and the Central Valley.

“I think he has to be careful,” GOP consultant Rob Stutzman said of Newsom. “The last time we had a non-competitive reelection for [Gov. Jerry] Brown in 2014, a midterm Democratic presidential election, it was a rough year for Democrats. That was their worst election of the decade in California.”

Newsom’s campaign — or lack of one — is in many ways a product of deep blue California, where Democrats hold a supermajority in the Legislature and outnumber Republicans two-to-one in voter registration. But it also suggests that the California governor — one of the most prominent Democrats outside of Washington — sees himself largely as a counterweight to a resurgent Republican Party that may be poised to retake the House and the presidency in 2024. It’s also fueled speculation that the governor is running a covert presidential primary campaign. https://www.politico.com/news/2022/10/30/gavin-newsom-campaign-reelection-00064071

Susan B. Glasser: Putin Is Inventing a Whole New Kind of Nuclear Blackmail

When Putin first started invoking the spectre of nuclear conflagration after invading Ukraine, Michael Dobbs, a historian whose book One Minute to Midnight is a definitive account of the 1962 standoff, pointed out that crisis had only lasted thirteen days, compared with the months or years that this one could persist. And of course, the longer the war in Ukraine goes on, the riskier it becomes. On Thursday, when I asked Dobbs to compare the two, his reply was unnerving. I don't see the same opportunities for defusing the current crisis with a Cuba-like compromise, he said, referring to the full withdrawal of Soviet missiles from Cuba in return for a non-invasion pledge from the U.S. and secret promise to dismantle American intermediate-range missiles in Turkey. Dobbs added, Mathematically, therefore—length of the crisis multiplied by the number of things that can go wrong and lack of obvious exit ramps—the degree of risk is comparable, perhaps higher now.

In other words, the rolling, protracted nuclear crisis he envisioned at the start of Russia’s war now seems to be happening—with no obvious short-term possibility for a deal to end it, given the horrific conventional war that Putin has launched and the existential stakes for Ukraine.

Sixty years ago, the Cuban missile crisis concluded less than two weeks before midterm elections in which Democrats performed better than expected. Republicans cried foul, saying President John F. Kennedy had used the crisis for his, and his party’s, political benefit. Barry Goldwater, who would be the G.O.P. nominee in the subsequent Presidential election, even alleged that Kennedy had timed the crisis specifically for maximum domestic political effect.

There will be no such benefit to Biden or his party this year. Quite the opposite, in fact. The politics of the war are increasingly fraught in Washington, and the House Minority Leader, Kevin McCarthy, recently suggested that if his party takes back the House—as it is expected to—Republicans will no longer provide a blank check for supporting Ukraine. Biden cannot even take his own party’s backing as an unquestioned guarantee going forward, a point reinforced this week when thirty Democrats in the Congressional Progressive Caucus sent him a letter that appeared to undercut the Administration’s policy by urging that he open immediate negotiations with Putin to end the war. Amid Putin’s nuclear bluster, it was a strikingly off-message line, and the representatives quickly withdrew the letter. But the point was made: This year’s midterms represent their own kind of superpower crisis. America’s political divisions are the world’s problem, too.

On the campaign trail, Ukraine has hardly registered as an issue, but that is only because so many fundamental questions about the future of American democracy are being contested. If Republicans take back one or both houses of Congress, the reverberations will surely be felt on the battlefield in Ukraine—and even more so if, as expected, Donald Trump soon thereafter announces he is running again for the White House. The former President has retained his admiration for Russia’s authoritarian leader. When Putin launched the invasion of Ukraine last winter, Trump even called his strategy genius. There is a real prospect that Trump could not only run but win. Does anyone doubt that Putin is waiting and hoping for just this outcome? Whatever you call it, this crisis may have only just begun.  https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-bidens-washington/putin-is-inventing-a-whole-new-kind-of-nuclear-blackmail

John Cassidy: Beware Elon Musk’s Takeover of Twitter

In recent years, all the big social-media companies, Twitter included, have, under public pressure, invested in content-moderation policies, which employ artificial-intelligence programs and actual humans to search out posts and users that violate the platforms’ terms-of-service agreements. On paper, Twitter’s rules are quite strict. They say that users can’t use the platform to threaten violence against an individual or a group of people, nor promote the glorification of violence, nor promote terrorism or violent extremism, nor encourage suicide or self-harm, nor engage in the targeted harassment of someone, or incite other people to do so, nor harass other people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, caste, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, or serious disease.

It was on the basis of these rules that Twitter, two days after the January 6th assault on the Capitol by supporters of Donald Trump, issued a permanent ban to the former President’s account due to the risk of further incitement of violence. Musk's insistence on free speech and his claims of left bias in Twitter policies have sparked concern that he would loosen content-moderation standards and let Trump back onto the platform. Such a move would likely be accompanied by the return of many other right-wing incendiaries and disinformation merchants.

The optimistic case for Musk’s purchase is that, since he is reportedly investing tens of billions of dollars of his own money, he has a strong incentive to make a financial success of it, and this wouldn’t be consistent with allowing the platform to turn into even more of a cesspit. To his credit, Musk has demonstrated a strong record of innovation at his other companies, and some of the proposals that he has floated for Twitter—such as eliminating spam or fake accounts; expanding subscriptions; and giving users more leeway to edit their tweets, or post longer ones—seem reasonable.

The pessimistic case is that Musk, in downplaying the dangers of adopting a laissez-faire approach to content, is being naïve, or that, despite his public assurances, he isn’t operating in good faith. While he claims to be a political centrist and a responsible new owner of Twitter, some of his own tweets have targeted individuals for abuse or echoed right-wing memes. Earlier this year, he said that he had voted Republican for the first time, supporting Mayra Flores, a conservative Texas congresswoman who won a special election in June. He also said that he was leaning toward supporting Florida’s Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, in 2024.

Musk is entitled to his political views, of course. But the world’s richest man now runs one of the world’s most powerful social-media platforms, and, since he is taking the company private, he won’t be answerable to public shareholders. That alone is an alarming development. Nobody should take it on trust that the outcome will be a benign one. https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/beware-elon-musks-takeover-of-twitter

Jeffrey Frankel: The allure of the GOP is baffling. Voters will regret falling for it

For many, the economy is top priority. History shows it will probably suffer under Republican rule.

American voters seem poised to hand the Republican Party control of the House of Representatives, and possibly the Senate as well, in November’s midterm elections. The same goes for many state races, where polls show Republicans gaining ground.

Such an outcome could have profound consequences for American democracy, especially if it results in even greater degradation of the U.S. electoral system. Given the large number of 2020 election deniers running for office in 2022 and the enormous power over how votes are cast and counted that victory would give them, this prospect is increasingly worrisome.

The Republicans’ likely midterm victory is baffling. The GOP is now dominated by an extremist faction whose prominent members claim (or have claimed) not only that former President Trump won the 2020 presidential election, but also that climate change is a hoax, COVID-19 is a conspiracy and former President Obama was not born in the United States. While many Republicans do not say such things (and many who do probably do not believe what they are saying), the Trumpian extremists are in charge.

Despite their hostility to most voters’ economic interests — and to democracy itself — the Republicans are still favored to win. That is inexplicable, and alarming. https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2022-10-27/republicans-midterms-election-deniers-economy

Jonathan Bernstein: Spin Election Results Now, Win Political Battles Later

A lot of election commentary this week has centered around the notion that Democrats are suddenly struggling. It looks like Democrats will have a tough Election Day. But that’s something we have known was likely since Joe Biden won the 2020 election. Political scientists find that midterms are mainly driven by the president’s popularity — which in turn tends to be a function of the economy. With a Democrat in the White House and with perceptions of the economy so negative, the chances for an overall winning year for Democrats have always been slim.

Indeed, as political scientist John Sides points out, analysis that just takes into account those fundamentals — presidential popularity and  economic sentiment — estimates that Republicans, all else being equal, would gain between 40 and 45 seats in the House and between one and three seats in the Senate. Some models are even more optimistic about Republican gains. As Sides says, ‘basic indicators suggest that 2022 should be bad for Democrats and you should calibrate your expectations to that.’ https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-10-28/midterms-2022-spin-election-results-now-win-political-battles-later

Maureen Dowd: The Pelosis and a Haunted America

Halloween has always been my favorite holiday. I loved putting up twinkling bats and watching midnight monster-chiller-horror movies.

Not this year.

The world is too scary. Politics is too creepy. Horror is too real.

Now the bad spirits are lurking all around us. They will not be driven off.

America seems haunted by random violence and casual cruelty every day. In New York, subway riders getting pushed onto the tracks and innocent bystanders being shot. Officials across the country facing kidnapping plots, armed visits to their homes, assaults and death threats. No place seems safe, from parks to schools to the supposedly impregnable, guarded Capitol and homes of the wealthy and well known.

In some states, women — and girls — seeking abortions are treated as criminals. In Uvalde, Texas, terrified children frantically calling the police are slaughtered by a teenage psychopath with an AR-15-style rifle as 376 police officers lingered in and around the elementary school waiting for … what?

Now comes news of a maniac breaking into a house in the middle of the night, bludgeoning an 82-year-old man in the head with a hammer while demanding to know where his famous wife was. Perfect Halloween movie fare. Except it actually happened.

The police said the intruder was David DePape, a 42-year-old from Berkeley, Calif. CNN reported that DePape’s relatives confirmed that a Facebook account spewing Trumpian conspiracies on topics ranging from climate change to Covid was his. In his posts, he cast doubt on the validity of the 2020 election — sharing pillow pusher and Trump lickspittle Mike Lindell’s absurd videos. And he defended the Trump rioters who stormed the Capitol.

On Twitter, Adam Kinzinger urged G.O.P. candidates and elected officials to speak out against the “horrific” attack. He probably didn’t have in mind the sort of speaking out that Gov. Glenn Youngkin of Virginia did. Youngkin made a joke of the assassination attempt: “There’s no room for violence anywhere, but we’re going to send her back to be with him in California.”

Democrats had a nice run, on climate change and gun legislation, and enjoyed some backlash to the Dark Prince of the Supreme Court, Samuel Alito. Now Republicans seem set to win back the House, and maybe the Senate, with a range of incompetent and hypocritical candidates.

“I cannot believe anybody would vote for these people,” Pelosi told The Times’s Carl Hulse on a fund-raising swing.

But a feral mood has taken hold. If you think Washington is monstrous now, just wait. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/28/opinion/pelosi-nancy-paul-attack.html

Chas Danner: New Twitter Owner Tweets, Then Deletes Pelosi-Attack Conspiracy Theory

Jacob Heilbrunn: How the Republican Fringe Became the Mainstream