Tag Archives: Kamala Harris

2020 General Election, Democracy

Cause for celebration: Joe Biden defeats Donald Trump

The Biden-Harris victory is an unalloyed good thing.

A clear majority of Americans — well apportioned among key battleground states — rejected Donald Trump at their first opportunity following his Electoral College victory in defiance of a popular vote majority in 2016. Joe Biden — a decent, caring, well-qualified man, who will genuinely seek to represent the whole country — will replace him.

No, the Democrats didn’t win the Senate (though there will be another go-round in Georgia in January), they lost seats in the House, and upwards of 70 million Americans voted to reelect a man monumentally unfit for the presidency. Mitch McConnell will relish obstructing Joe Biden at every turn. Republicans in most states will control redistricting for the next decade. Enacting a progressive agenda is not yet on the horizon.

The next four years will be highly challenging. But I’m too much of an optimist to presuppose that the Biden presidency is doomed to failure, that the 2022 elections will mark a further setback, or that 2024 will return Republicans to the White House.

From the January 2017 Women’s March through the 2020 voting that concluded on Tuesday, Americans have organized in opposition to Trump and the GOP. The political struggle is hardly over. But it brought an extraordinarily significant victory this week.

That’s cause for celebration.

(Photo of the President-elect from Wikimedia Commons.)

2020 General Election, Democrats, Donald Trump, Republicans

Joe Biden offers a sharp contrast to Donald Trump with his embrace of Kamala Harris,Hagar the Horrible, and Søren Kierkegaard

In selecting California Senator Kamala Harris as his running mate, Joe Biden has embraced the diversity of the Democratic coalition. An eminently well-qualified woman of color of a different generation than the former vice president rounds out a well balanced ticket to take on Donald Trump and Mike Pence, who lead the monochromatic Republican Party.

In a photograph of Biden and Harris chatting by video, a Danish philosopher and the author of Nihilism (The MIT Press Essential Knowledge series) spotted a Hagar the Horrible cartoon behind the former VP’s laptop.

That cartoon suggests that a higher being (whether the God of Biden’s Catholicism or an ancient Norse deity) directing the storms and tribulations bedeviling Hagar doesn’t answer to any man. Whether or not an individual suffers misfortune is often the furthest thing from a personal choice.

No one needs that comic reminder less than Joe Biden, who lost his first wife and their one-year-old daughter in 1972 and his oldest son, Beau, in 2015, and has credited his faith with helping sustain him. In an interview with Stephen Colbert, four months after Beau’s death, Biden spoke about putting one foot in front of the other when experiencing great suffering — and of other people who keep going when confronted with tragedy in their lives.

. . . Think of all the people you know who are going through horrible things and they get up every morning, And they put one foot in front of the other. And they don’t have, like I said, anything like the support I have.

I marvel, I marvel at … at the ability of people to absorb hurt and just get back up. And most of them do it with an incredible sense of empathy to other people. . . .

Joe Biden talks about putting one foot in front of the other with Stephen Colbert.

Biden tells Colbert that his wife Jill tapes quotes to his bathroom mirror, which he sees in the morning when he shaves. Biden has mentioned one quote, from Kierkegaard — “Faith sees best in the dark” — on several occasions. It illustrates that when tragedy strikes, when our suffering is most intense, reason (human understanding) has nothing to offer — that’s when believers must rely on faith.

One need not share Biden’s faith (as Colbert does) to appreciate the man’s compassion and empathy for other human beings. The Colbert interview offers a sense of the man whom Democrats have chosen as their candidate for president. His empathy distinguishes him in a fundamental way from the current occupant of the White House. Indeed, the contrast could hardly be greater.

It is extraordinary and calamitous to have Donald Trump as president in the time of a global pandemic. The man hears of the deaths of Americans — more than 165,000 and counting — and thinks only of the misfortune to himself.

Trump often launches into a monologue placing himself at the center of the nation’s turmoil. The president has cast himself in the starring role of the blameless victim — of a deadly pandemic, of a stalled economy, of deep-seated racial unrest, all of which happened to him rather than the country. (“Trump the victim: President complains in private about the pandemic hurting him,” by Ashley Parker, Philip Rucker, and Josh Dawsey)

And while Trump is psychologically deviant — an outlier unrepresentative of his party, the GOP still embraces him and accepts the harm he brings. Moreover, one of the fundamental differences between Democrats and Republicans is the empathy that Democrats feel for others — including folks not in our tribe — who suffer.

We might draw the contrast this way: The circle of moral concern — the width and breadth and diversity of the group of human beings whom Democrats regard empathetically — is clearly greater by far than the batch of folks whom Republicans view as worthy of moral consideration.

Think of those kids separated at the border to illustrate this point. Or of our Kurdish allies, whom Trump sold out to Erdogan. Or of tens of millions of Americans — our neighbors — without adequate health care coverage.

Americans will have a stark choice — Trump-Pence or Biden-Harris — on the ballot this fall.

2020 Democratic Primary, Democrats

If only the women running for the Democratic nomination were more likable

“A gentle warning to Democrats who are newly awakened to the prospect of Amy Klobuchar:

Remember that right now you like her. . . .

A woman but not, you know, the Elizabeth Warren kind of woman everyone had decided they didn’t like or couldn’t win. . . An electable woman. Acceptable to the assorted Biden castoffs and Buttigieg skeptics. . . .” — Monica Hesse (“You like Amy Klobuchar now? Remember that when your inner sexist starts doubting her,” WaPo, February 13, 2020).

As Hesse reminds us, Hillary Clinton had a 65% approval rating as Secretary of State, while Kamala Harris and Kirsten Gillibrand made strong positive first impressions when they declared their candidacies — until doubts about how likable (or, in some way or another, how presidential) they were overtook them.

In a November 2019 post, I noted that Elizabeth Warren was being transformed from a “cheerful, exuberant, uber-competent woman who simply gets things done and makes everyone feel included and proud” — à la Mary Poppins — into another unlikable Democratic woman.

I’m still with Ed Kilgore: C’mon, Democrats, don’t buy into Trump’s misogyny. Women serving in the House, the Senate, as governors and state legislators, and in local offices all the way down the electoral ladder are highly successful.

There is a long list of reasons why Hillary Clinton lost to Donald Trump in 2016: Vladimir Putin; Steve Bannon, Robert Mercer, and Clinton Cash; James Comey; complacency; her campaign’s neglect of voters in Michigan and Wisconsin … I could go on and on, and never mention sexism.

But after 2016, Democrats are spooked. They are second-guessing their own judgment — er, um, the judgment of other voters — on who is best qualified to beat Trump. Gotta make a safe choice, right?

Wouldn’t it be great to elect a woman, though? Kilgore quotes Li Zhou, who makes the case that the prospect of electing women creates added excitement among Democratic voters. Remember 2018 when Democrats, and a record number of women candidates, took back the House?

After November 2016, and the Mueller Report, and the Senate acquittal of Trump, and the week since the acquittal, fear is gripping Democrats by the throat.

Better — in my view — to act with clarity and confidence of what matters to Democrats, of what we stand for, of the vision and priorities that distinguish us from Republicans, than to succumb to fear and a thousand doubts about electability.

2020 Democratic Primary

Is Kamala Harris “the most natural” political talent among the Democratic candidates? Not so fast!

“…I come to praise Harris today, not dismiss her. As the savvy political analyst Sean Trende wrote last week, she is the most natural politician in the field, and people are now underrating her chances.” – David Leonhardt, New York Times

I agree with Leonhardt (and Jonathan Bernstein, who linked to this op-ed): there’s no reason to count out Kamala Harris in her quest for the Democratic presidential nomination. It’s hardly out of the question that she could pull off a victory (though she’s experiencing a “summer slump,” in Leonhardt’s words).

It’s Leonhardt’s point – and Sean Trende’s – about Harris as the most naturally talented candidate in the field that I question. Trende phrased it this way: “She’s the most natural political athlete of the bunch …”

In the last presidential campaign the Democratic nominee conceded that she wasn’t a natural at seeking office, which serves to put the compliment of Harris in perspective.

Hillary Clinton is not a natural politician, nor is she a natural public speaker. This is not my opinion; this is Clinton’s own. “Look, I have said before and it won’t surprise anybody to hear me say it, this is not easy for me,” Clinton said at a debate in March. “I am not a natural politician, in case you haven’t noticed, like my husband or President Obama.” She has to work hard, in other words, to achieve something that appears to be an innate gift for many of her peers.

If this was meant to endear the voting public toward her, it’s not clear that it worked. Last week, Jamelle Bouie used Clinton’s own “natural politician” line in perhaps exactly the opposite way that Clinton’s camp hoped it would be used, as an example of the reasons why liberals are worried that “she doesn’t inspire in ways we expect our presidential hopefuls to inspire”; a Salon piece echoed that sentiment, repeating the line that she lacks “the charm of her husband or the charisma of Barack Obama.”

So is charm or charisma the mark of natural political talent? Or a savvy gift for relating to people, perhaps?

In an earlier political era, Lyndon Johnson was often referred to as a natural-born politician:

Johnson was … just a natural politician.…

When he was a senator, he was about to embark on a re-election campaign tour back in Texas and convened his speechwriters to review a draft speech that they had done for him. Johnson reviews this speech and he comes upon a passage from Socrates.

And he looks at this passage, and he says, “Socrates? Socrates? Now, let me get this straight. I’m going back home to Texas to talk to just plain folks, and you have me quoting Socrates?” He said, “Keep the quote in, but start it with, ‘My daddy always used to say…”

Johnson had an instinctive understanding of how to connect to people and, often, this was attributed to LBJ’s yearning for connection, to his passion for hand-shaking and back-slapping. (Quite unlike Hillary Clinton, certainly.)

Johnson is a back-slapper, a shoulder hugger, a knee squeezer. “I like to press the flesh,” he says, “and look a man in the eye.”

As Hillary Clinton suggested, the former Secretary of State’s spouse, the exceedingly empathetic Bill Clinton, has long been regarded as a natural pol.

“Bill Clinton is an incredibly gifted politician. Bill Clinton is a room and it doesn’t matter how many people are in the room, you think he’s talking to you.”

Paul Krugman, who made this observation about Clinton, contrasted him to Barack Obama. “But, in fact, Bill Clinton was not a consequential president. And Obama, although clearly not the natural politician, is a consequential president.”

Perhaps Krugman is suggesting that Obama was too cerebral, too reserved, to be considered a natural à la LBJ or Bill Clinton. Another contrast (of two legendary California pols) draws on that distinction: Jerry Brown, elected and reelected to the governorship of California twice (serving two terms beginning in 1975 and then again in 2011), was often compared with his father, Pat Brown (governor in an earlier era), who was thought of as the natural.

This small world, held together by a dense web of friendships and favors, was made-to-order for a man like Pat Brown. Smart, affable, and energetic, Pat had a natural politician’s ready laugh and long memory.

…

Jerry was unlike his father in many ways: less amiable, more introspective, and less disciplined, he was not a natural politician.

Does being a natural politician hinge on amiability, camaraderie, a longing for contact with people – or on a different skill set? Some observers might insist that (contrary to Krugman’s assessment) the intelligent, savvy Obama – a more restrained, more cool (in Marshall McLuhan’s sense) persona than LBJ, Bill Clinton, or Pat Brown – was nonetheless a natural politician. His personal gifts, including his oratory, were certainly a foundation of his political success.

I’d add that Jerry Brown’s successes over a long career arguably surpass those of his father. And Brown completely dominated Sacramento in his final two terms as governor.

Perhaps this mastery, after decades of experience, was learned and not natural? Surely that is not a distinction that the assessment of Harris’s political talent hinges on. First elected in 2004, she has been immersed in the political world even longer. She’s had ample time to learn.

Just to cover all the bases, let’s turn to the other side of the aisle. The most successful Republican political figure in the past half century, Ronald Reagan, was renowned for his stage presence, especially in front of the camera, and for communicating evocative themes in clear, simple terms with convincing sincerity.

Above all, Ronald Reagan was also a natural politician. Virtually every new account demonstrates that the stage and not the Statehouse or Capitol Hill may be the most effective launching pad for power in a picture culture.

He clearly had a knack for politics. Reagan was elected president of the Screen Actors Guild in 1947, long before he spent years honing conservative talking points as a spokesman for General Electric. But, natural or not, Reagan (as with the other successful politicians) had decades to develop into the iconic figure we remember – ‘the great communicator’ who could speak for a nation.

I’ll readily grant that Kamala Harris has an impressive array of political skills. But what is it, exactly, that she has that none of the other Democratic candidates possess in such ample measure? Why is she “the most natural political athlete of the bunch”?

She’s a good debater – sometimes; that is, when she is well-prepped in advance and doesn’t have to think on her feet (though thus far she has turned in an impressive performance in one debate out of three). A handful of sharp questions in the Senate Judiciary Committee also speak of ample preparation, not agility.

Harris – like Pat Brown, as referenced above – has a ready laugh (even when she laughs longer and harder than anyone else in the room at her own quips).

Is she charismatic? That’s a loaded word. One that is often associated with youth, vigor, and – yes – good looks. Think of JFK. Think also of Barack Obama’s enthusiastic commentary on Harris as “the best-looking attorney general in the country.” Trende’s use of the word ‘athlete’ is also suggestive. Does charisma turn on physicality, if not physical attractiveness?

In Leonhardt’s own reckoning, the Harris campaign (at this stage) has exposed a couple of significant weaknesses. “There is a pattern here. Harris can be too quick to speak or react without thinking.” The second weakness is her failure to “develop a clearer theory of her campaign’s case.” In other words, to articulate why she is running for president. She must, Leonhardt advises, “help voters understand her values and priorities.”

Leonhardt continues, “Over the last several months, I’ve had several Democratic voters tell me a version of the same story. They had just listened to Harris appear on television or a podcast, and they really wanted to like her. Yet she didn’t quite meet their expectations. They weren’t sure exactly who she was.”

Leonhardt and I – with those Democratic voters he’s spoken with – are in agreement again. But I think that singling out Harris as the “most natural” talent among the dozen or so experienced Democratic candidates pursuing the nomination reveals a hunger for an inspirational opponent to take on Donald Trump; a hope that Harris will live up to her resume and her identity and those fleeting moments in front of the cameras when she prosecuted the case (against Barr and Biden, for instance); a fervent desire to read into her something Democrats long for – rather than a reasonable assessment of Senator Harris’s political touch circa 2019.

Ed Kilgore writes today of Senator Harris:

From the get-go, she was a smart-money favorite. She was telegenic, well-spoken, and multiracial (half-Asian-American, half-African-American, and married to a white Jewish guy to boot), with a solid résumé of federal, state, and local offices — and nary an electoral defeat.

Democrats have been pulling for her – longing for her to succeed. But, as we watch the primary play out, do Harris’s political skills really set her apart?

The best politicians, those with a real mastery, seem to enjoy the give and take of the political arena. And we enjoy watching political figures – at least those on our side – who thrive in that environment, those who make it look easy and effortless. We may call them naturals.

I have no doubt that Sean Trende can make a case for the natural talent of the junior Senator from California. But placing her above everyone else in this diverse group of candidates? I don’t believe that what we’ve actually witnessed can justify that judgment.

2020 General Election, Democrats

Trump has spooked Democrats, who fear nominating a women for president

Quote of the day:

“Trump has so thoroughly demoralized Democrats that they are exhibiting sexism in their own political judgments in the guise of ‘electability.'” — Ed Kilgore, New York Magazine

Kilgore links to Li Zhou’s attempt (in Vox) to knock down fears (based on Trump’s 2016 election) that voters are not ready to elect a woman president.

Women powered the 2018 midterm victories to take back the House. And, as Zhou observes, most of the seats flipped from Red to Blue were won by women.

Zhou also notes that Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris, as well as Amy Klobuchar and Kirsten Gillibrand, have never lost an election. In contrast, Joe Biden — Mr. Electability, a safe white male — (when not on a ticket with Barack Obama) suffered two not-even-close defeats in previous bids for the White House.

Zhou notes the added enthusiasm generated by women and people of color; cites the lack of empirical evidence that a woman can’t win in the Midwest (or elsewhere); and rejects electability as a squishy, untrustworthy guide.

Kilgore concludes:

So if you happen to have two women, one “progressive” and one “moderate,” who can credibly promise a greater 2020 payoff than just ejecting Trump from office, why keep preferring men who appear to live in a different era (Biden) or country (Sanders)? Yes, Trump has gotten deeply into the donkey’s head, and has convinced Democrats that his dark misogynistic soul is America’s. That’s some serious damage.

(Image from Wikipedia, which offers this description: A satirical photo from 1901, with the caption “New Woman—Wash Day”. Shown is a woman wearing knickerbockers and knee socks (traditional male attire) and smoking a cigarette, supervising as a man (who appears to be wearing a dress and an apron) does the laundry with a tub and washboard.)

2020 Democratic Primary, Democrats

Donald Trump ran and won as a moderate – more moderate than Clinton (in voters’ eyes)

Quote of the day (Editor’s emphasis added):

” Many progressives have what they believe to be a knock-down answer to nervous Nellies who fret that talking about desegregation busing, decriminalizing illegal entry into the United States, banning assault weapons, and replacing private health insurance will kill them at the polls in 2020: Donald Trump is president.
If Trump is president, the thinking goes, it’s the ultimate proof of “lol nothing matters” politics. And if anything does matter, it’s riling up your base to go to war, not trimming and tucking to persuade precious swing voters. The old rules no longer apply, or perhaps they were never true at all.
Activists are pressing candidates to take aggressively progressive stands on broad issues like Medicare-for-all but also narrower ones like including undocumented immigrants in health care plans and providing relief from graduate school debt.
This is, however, precisely the wrong lesson to learn from the Trump era.
It’s true that Trump is president, but it’s not true that Trump ran and won as an ideological extremist. He paired extremely offensive rhetoric on racial issues with positioning on key economic policy topics that led him to be perceived by the electorate as a whole as the most moderate GOP nominee in generations. His campaign was almost paint-by-numbers pragmatic moderation. He ditched a couple of unpopular GOP positions that were much cherished by party elites, like cutting Medicare benefits, delivered victory, and is beloved by the rank and file for it. ” – Matthew Yglesias

Yglesias provides documentation justifying my headline and the selected quotation, which begins his piece. I’ll add that Democrats flipped the House in 2018 by presenting a clear contrast with Donald Trump’s Republican Party, not by reaching to the left edge of the Democratic Party.*

Fearless editor’s fretting: Elizabeth Warren is far and away my favorite United States Senator. I’d like to vote for her for president. Warren’s stance on Medicare for All (rather than Pete Buttigieg’s Medicare for All Who Want It) and the elimination of private insurance strikes me as a huge political miscalculation – and, independently, as bad public policy** – for someone who wishes to turn Trump out of office in November 2020.

I’ve voted for Kamala Harris in several statewide elections. She is high on my list of prospective Democratic nominees. Harris has twice endorsed the elimination of private insurance and twice walked it back the next day. This, much more than her past hedging (“We should have that conversation“), sows doubts about whether her tool chest of political skills – while impressive – is stocked with everything she needs to run a high stakes national campaign against Trump. She’s very good when she’s well scripted (though perhaps the script isn’t always reliable). And I’m not yet convinced that she’s “quick on her feet.”

* Taxing the rich is popular. I’m ready to take that stride to the left. Taking away someone’s health insurance is highly unpopular, for reasons – I’d argue – that are sound. See the note below.

** In my view, this policy shift is a heavy lift, which cries out for an incremental approach as we figure out in stages how to do it right and how to ameliorate the unwanted consequences. Furthermore, without a Democratic lock on the White House, the Congress, and the Supreme Court, the risk of Republicans sabotaging things during the transition (as they’ve done with ACA and Warren’s CFPB) are far too high. If the shift to Medicare for All Who Want It is done well, this will serve to reassure the public on the wisdom of a more radical change.

Republicans, Tribalism

Horrors! Brit Hume is embarrassed by presidential campaign coverage

The occasion? Senator Kamala Harris, while campaigning in South Carolina, purchased a colorful sequined jacket.

Robin Abcarian notes that “manly” endeavors, such as Brit Hume’s skydiving with Bush 41, a publicity stunt for the campaign of the former president’s son, apparently do not count as embarrassing. Nor did Hume display any discomfiture about pitching softball questions after the jump to the candidate’s father about W’s campaign.

Abacarian chalks this up as sexism and a double standard. Maybe so, but I’ll offer another theory: it is shameless partisanship by a TV personality working for a cable channel, Fox News, that is bound at the hip to the Republican Party.

Sean Hannity serves as a co-host with Trump at his campaign rallies and acts as a presidential advisor by phone, while offering fawning coverage on the air. Nothing new here.

Tucker Carlson erupts, when confronted with a point of view (millionaires and billionaires should pay higher taxes) that’s the polar opposite of the Republican Party’s prime directive and then told that, in his role at Fox, he is “not meant to say these things.” Of course he’s not, nor does he need to be told.

Bret Hume, never doubt for a moment, is as much in the corner of the Republican Party as anyone at the conservative network. It’s not vintage ’80s clothing, or journalistic standards, or the peculiar way campaigns are run that’s agitating Hume. It’s simpler than that. This woman is running to replace Donald Trump in the White House. Oh, my.

March 2, 2019 update: Let’s add another Fox News on-air personality to the Republican hack list: Jeanine Pirro, whose starring role at Trumpetts USA events – yes, this is a thing and it enriches the President of the United States – was featured in a recent Erik Wemple column, which concluded that “the race to the bottom at Fox News has hit the homestretch. So long as Hannity has set the standard for ethical corruption with direct support to Trump World, how can the network even consider stopping someone like Pirro from speaking at an event from which the president profits?”


Democrats, Donald Trump, Income Inequality

The Howard Schultz campaign is already helping Donald Trump

“After this week’s CNN town hall, it’s more and more clear that any money Howard Schultz might spend on an independent presidential bid would function as an in-kind campaign contribution to Donald Trump.” – Ronald Brownstein

“To win a majority of electoral college votes, which Schultz says would be his goal, he would have to ultimately replace the Democratic nominee as the favored choice of voters who do not want Trump to win a second term.” – Michael Scherer

Schultz has praised the “thoughtful analysis” of a conservative commentator who fears the Democrats will nominate a “hard-left” candidate and – in the course of the column – demeans Kamala Harris (“shrill … quasi-socialist promising pie in the sky”), Elizabeth Warren (“Fauxcahontas … playing a game of socialist one-upmanship”), and “supposedly centrist” Joe Biden. The critic also name-checks Bernie Sanders and, of course, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. 

Schultz, who claims to be a “lifelong Democrat” – but not a very attentive one (“Schultz voted in just 11 of 38 elections dating back to 2005”), took back the praise he had offered after folks actually read the “thoughtful analysis” he was promoting;  he deleted the tweet when he was asked about it by the Washington Post, and blamed someone else for posting the link on his personal Twitter account.

Nonetheless, he embraces the conservative views expressed in the deleted column. It’s the “hard-left,” “quasi-socialist” Democrats that Schultz fears and, most scary and objectionable of all, the proposal (broached by conservatives’ favorite new Democratic Member of Congress, Ocasio-Cortez) to raise the marginal tax rate for incomes over $10 million to 70% (the level in the United States in 1980).

When asked at his CNN Town Hall what he thinks his personal income tax rate – as a billionaire – should be, Schutz concedes that he “should pay more taxes,” but tap dances for more than a minute (with platitudes about corporate taxes, the Republican tax bill, comprehensive tax reform, as well as personal income tax rates for millionaires) without giving an answer, at which point the moderator Poppy Harlow reminds him of the question and asks, “Give me a sense. Are you talking about you should pay 2% higher? Ten percent higher, twenty percent higher federal income tax?”

He stammers and says, “I don’t – Poppy, I don’t know what the number is….”

“Ballpark it for people,” she asks.

He won’t. He finally gets to the heart of his concern, “I think that what’s being proposed at 70% is a punitive number. And I think there are better ways to do this.”

Better ways. In other words, instead of significant increases in the personal tax rates of billionaires, we should seek revenue increases somewhere else.

Brownstein notes that on issue after issue, Schultz’s positions align with Democrats, while alienating Trump’s Republican base.

“To obscure his tilt toward the Democrats on almost all issues, Schultz has quickly settled on a strategy of loudly criticizing ideas popular on the party’s far-left flank.”

Brownstein perceives in Schultz’s strategy echoes of the (now defunct) centrist group, the Democratic Leadership Council, which Bill Clinton embraced in his trek to the White House.  But there’s a huge difference in the two strategies. The DLC and Clinton worked for years “inside the Democratic Party.” Regardless of what you think of Clinton or his policies, he sought to “rebuild a political majority that would allow Democrats to regain control of the national agenda from the increasingly militant conservatism within the GOP.”

Schultz seeks to do the opposite: to split the Democrats and peel off Democratic voters to his independent campaign.

‘Exaggerating the power of the left in the Democratic coalition, he’s portraying the party as beyond redemption for anyone holding centrist views. To make that case, Schultz is echoing claims from Trump and other Republicans that Democrats have become radical. At times, Schultz has even called some of the Democratic ideas he opposes “un-American” or “not American,” not to mention “punitive” and “ridiculous.”

By validating the Republican efforts to portray Democrats as outside the mainstream, Schultz is helping Trump already.’

2020 Democratic Primary, Democrats

Senator Kamala Harris introduces Rent Relief Act to help 13.3 million working families

California Senator Kamala Harris, who has been talked about as a Democratic candidate for president, has introduced legislation to provide refundable tax credits to benefit 13.3 million rent-burdened families. ‘Refundable’ means they would receive cash, even if they owed no taxes.

In many urban areas – including in Senator Harris’s home state of California and especially in places with booming economies, such as the Silicon Valley – the lack of affordable housing constitutes a crisis. The Department of Housing and Urban Development defines affordability as “the extent to which enough rental housing units of different costs can provide each renter household with a unit it can afford (based on the 30-percent-of-income standard).” The National Low Income Housing Coalition, which accepts this standard, has documented a significant national gap between wages and rents.

“A full-time worker earning the federal minimum wage of $7.25 needs to work approximately 122 hours per week for all 52 weeks of the year, or approximately three full-time jobs, to afford a two-bedroom rental home at the national average fair market rent. The same worker needs to work 99 hours per week for all 52 weeks of the year, or approximately two and a half full-time jobs, to afford a one-bedroom home at the national average fair market rent.”

The Rent Relief Act would provide tax credits for renters across the country with limited incomes who pay more than 30% of their incomes for rent and utilities. Below $25,000, the subsidy would be 100% of the cost of rent that exceeds 30% of income. In very expensive areas, the income ceiling would be $124,999, which would yield a 25% subsidy of the excess. (That’s not a lot of spending power for a family of four in some cities.)

This proposal certainly represents a bracing expansion of federal policy related to renters (though the tax code is strewn with ample benefits for homeowners). Irony watch: while this is more grist for the mill in talk of the Democratic Party’s move to the left, and chatter about democratic socialism, especially since the election of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez – the Rent Relief Act is actually a revision of a proposal introduced by Representative Joe Crowley, the old guard Democrat whom Occasio-Cortez defeated.

It’s easy to find fault with this approach to high rents based on the principle of supply and demand: if there is a shortage of affordable houses and apartments, then the obvious solution is to build more. As the supply goes up, prices will come down. Instead, in cities with the most expensive rental rates, restrictive zoning laws, minimal parking requirements, and opposition by residents to denser housing in their neighborhoods (and in the neighborhoods through which they commute each day), ensure that the supply of affordable housing is severely restricted where it is most needed (including in prosperous cities in blue states, such as California). So local regulations and neighborhood opposition quashes the development of new housing.

The virtue of Harris’s proposal is that it is straightforward in concept: rents are too high for wage earners, so give them money to pay the rent. Whether refunding taxes or providing subsidies, the federal government is capable of dispensing money.

The most successful anti-poverty program in history is Social Security. As complicated as the rules are, it’s simple in concept, and that’s one reason for its success. Folks need not be well-versed in Social Security rules to understand that they (and their employers) support the program with taxes, and when they retire, they draw monthly benefits.

In my view, Living Wage Ordinances (locally) or expanded Earned Income Tax Credits (nationally) would make more sense. Why line the pockets of landlords with rental subsidies? With increased EITC funding, the government could provide additional income – unrestricted – so folks could decide how to spend the money: food, clothes, education, transportation – whatever – not just housing.

Of course conservatives will object to creation of another ‘entitlement.’ Where will the money come from? Kevin Drum has an idea – or rather eleven (each with a footnote) – on places to adjust the budget to come up with the cash.

It’s all a matter of priorities. Do we help low-wage workers struggling to pay the rent, or do we dish out more tax reductions to the rich?

Photo: Senator Harris on Twitter.