Magdi Jacobs

His framing made me think about Americans' perceptions of the economy in different terms. When they rank a politician on "the economy," perhaps they are doing so with typical *individualistic* American mentality. "The economy" is=how much money do *I* save, make, spend, etc. Maybe this is obvious!

I spoke to a South Asian man recently (Harris voter) who heavily critiqued other South Asian men for how they had voted. He was speaking about his own demo so I don't want to endorse/not-endorse, but I'll offer his observation: "They thought Trump would make them money."

This is actually very good news, if we operate from the (accurate) baseline assumptions that American voters 1) are pretty uninformed about the economy & 2) Tend to rank Republicans more highly than Dems. That big of a swing in two years--especially given discontent in Biden years--is a big deal.

Per NBC polling, Democrats and Republicans are essentially tied on the question of who would do better handling economy: 38-37. At this point in September, 2023, roughly a year before the 2024 election, Republicans had a 21 point edge. www.nbcnews.com/politics/ele...

Sorry, it's weird you felt the need to tell me this. I have no idea why people engage in this kind of pedantic vacuousness. If you're not interested: Move On. You don't have to per formatively tell other people how uninterested you are. Then you just render everything more boring.

This extremely concise H4 is probably the correct answer, lol bsky.app/profile/empt...

Maybe MTG & other "rising stars" (so sorry to use that term, lol) sense a continuing weakness in the GOP brand. Maybe they don't care so much about their constituents (& losing their seats), but they do care about their national future; these possible fractures should be noted.

. . .She sees herself as a national star. There are other Republicans, like Tucker Carlson, who have positioned themselves somewhat like this in the past (not sure of his current position). Trump's a "faux-populist" in the economic sense, not in the grievance/racist sense.

. . .H2 continued. . .Her constituents may be calling her, but she is in so deep a red district she doesn't feel compelled to do anything
-Factors informing a possible H3, which I might favor, but have not formulated: She's sensing broader political tides in core R constituencies. . . .

I'm not sure what my favored hypothesis (H) is right now & frankly I'm too tired to explore it, but I'll throw out a few thoughts:
-I reject H1 that she actually cares about the issue
-I am understanding, but dubious, re: H2: "listening" to her constituents UNLESS she has a strong GOP challenger. .

I get hives whenever someone says, "I hate to say it, but Marjorie Taylor Greene has a point" (which for some reason people love to say), but I will note that it is of political and historical interest that this dynamic could be occurring within the Republican Party. There are a few hypotheses, here

In historical terms: when did this shift occur? Is it for the first time now? Or did it start before? Either way: Repubs now feel like they have to at least lie about protecting parts of the ACA. That didn't use to be the case. It was their bête noir. A major propoganda point.

Republican Senate Majority leader reassuring the public re: the "basics of ACA" (& his reassurances are lies) is interesting. Particularly in the midst of a government shutdown w/ some role reversals occurring. Signals need for defense of ACA; possible weakness.

Maybe it's happened & I just haven't noticed it. If you have, we should pinpoint the time when they shifted from full-frontal ACA attack to "Don't worry about the baseline of ACA." That's a shift. It's either new or it happened & we didn't notice. Either way. . . .

John Thune is nervous. He just spread a bunch of lies on @pbsnewshour but I noticed one thing in particular: He reassured the audience that the underlying structure of ACA would be intact. He's lying. But I don't think I've heard a Republican make a promise about ACA like that before. Have you?

They’re scared. “Could be in the thousands” is an enormous walk back from Vought’s threats.

Look at what Neera Tanden was publishing in 2020, a few months before she was nominated by Biden for OMB. People tanked her nomination. People payed *much more attention* to her nomination than they ever did to Vought's. Time to ask "why?" & whether or not this behavior is bad.

Neera Tanden got in the news, stayed in the news, and drove social media discussion in a way Vought never has. If that doesn't show us the superficiality of some of our discussions, I don't know what else will. We like to debate what we have control over. What gives us "cred."

I feel like now is as good a time as ever to say that people on social media & in the news spent infinitely more time on Neera Tandem's nomination for OMB (2021) than they ever did for Russell Vought (2025). This difference, which is a pretty clear comparison, should tell us something.

They’re nervous. Recognize their anxiety. Work with that in mind. They don’t necessarily want this. Don’t give them more power than they have. If they seem nervous, take note. They seem nervous.

Republicans are nervous about this. Keep the pressure on them.

I don't think Republicans feel strong going into this shutdown. I think they actually feel weak. There are things that social media users can do to reinforce this weakness.

That's the nature of my comment: Republicans do not seem confident, including Vance. They seem a tad bit defensive. Watch and see if you observe the same. They don't feel great about this. Whatever you think Democrats should do, it is worth noting if Republicans are showing weakness.

I'm not going to comment on what Democrats should do. I have my opinion, but I always recognize that there are no good options. Here is what I will comment on. Republicans are often, in our view, "invulnerable." JD Vance did not appear invulnerable in his commentary today. He seemed nervous.

I want to point a very important detail of this:

Jeffries is holding a press conference trashing Trump.

And only CSPAN is carrying it.

And that is the problem with America right now. The only place Democrats get any press coverage are places where no one watches.

Hunter Biden was an imperfect victim, so we dropped the ball by not highlighting that he was being attacked by a Republican weaponized DOJ. We thought we were being high and mighty on a pedestal of purity, but we were actually allowing the DOJ to become even worse.

Trump is weaponizing every lever of power he possesses--in the Federal Gov't & beyond--to persecute his political opponents/percieved enemies, as well as individual immigrants, college students, etc. He is accelerating this process. We need to look at all of this as a unified agenda.

Yet this is where we are. On a road paved with imperfection, paved, perhaps, with men we loathe, or people who we believe did perhaps do something wrong. To attend to the specifics of each case is a mistake. We should look, instead, towards orienting each case in the broader constellation.

Whereas the Civil Rights Movement actively sought "perfect" victims to elucidate social problems, the Trump administration has typically sought "imperfect" victims to advance the opposite: authoritarianism. Few of Trump's primary opponents--liberals--have any appetite to boldly defend John Bolton.

Think of the "deportees"--the disappeared--as well. Those who have seemed "perfect" at first induced public outcry; then their imperfections--in some cases serious crimes--came to light. Kimmel's case was diff. "Why go after *that* guy?" There will be more Boltons & Comeys b4 there are more Kimmels.