It also bears noting that Ukraine is likely to be a big winner from the Iran war; Russia can't get Shahed drones, while Ukraine has gained new allies and customers for its drones.

The party has spent years selecting candidates appealing to the "middle" because the GOP has shifted so far right that progressives could be expected to "vote blue no matter who". Now those same progressives form the core of the "resistance", and the party establishment is a bit worried.

No, it reflects the observation that voters dislike taxes and can be pushed into demanding lower taxes when they are too disengaged to heed messaging that says "we need to fund government services".

It's not a single election issue. Citizens in a democracy have to remember Lord Acton's observation that "power corrupts"; citizens have to keep an eye on what their electeds do and vote them out of office when it becomes necessary.

"Hades needs its king"

Yes, but you need the votes to convict. One (not yet feasible) approach is an impeachment campaign that starts with the smaller fish and builds momentum that will deliver votes to convict DJT.

Yeah, I remember. Being a decent human being doesn't help if you can't connect with Congress because you've kept the same staff you had as governor.

There isn't much room left for progressive policy making--progressive policy will fall to Congress. There we will really need progressive leadership.

Then there are the R&D funders: NSF, DOE, NIH, etc. The current administration has done its best to dismantle federal investments in the future. The next President will exercise a lot of power. And power corrupts--that means we need to look for character more than vision for the next President.

Foreign aid, DNI, HHS, DHS: these all need to be rebuilt to better serve the American people and clean up the mess left by this administration. And then there is the Department of State--rebuilding international relationships is going to be a major challenge.

The DoD and the defense industry need serious change--the traditional "spare no expense" approach to hardware cannot deal with a world in which combat is carried out via inexpensive drones/robotic munitions. That means smaller budgets to force radical change in procurement priorities.

A key goal of the next President should be to dismantle the imperial presidency and allow Congress to restore balance between branches of government. That's going to be difficult when most of the Executive Branch needs to be rebuilt.

Perhaps, but she'd hate the job. The next President is going to have to be a hardliner on "rule of law", but spend most of his/her time on rebuilding the government. That means finding an AG who has to rebuild the DOJ while being impartially focused on rooting out any and all corruption.

Expertise or intel? I remember the Cold War USSR as being a black box where you heard from the leaders, but tourists were provided with handlers and cosseted in bugged hotels and so saw nothing of import. Modern comms provide a lot more visibility than we had then.

Yes, but if the markets had more political impact than inflation, Trump's polling numbers would be rapidly returning to where he started this term from instead of continuing to sink.

Sigh. "The Death of Expertise" comes to econometrics.

Damn! Someone needs to tell Jay Powell and the Fed that they are using the wrong metrics--inflation metrics and labor statistics are now obsolete measures of the economy. Personally, I think that touting stock market behavior is done to get donors to shell out for campaign contributions.

I was never fond of scrapple, so I'm sure that your judgement is better than mine.

This should send a shiver up the spine of anyone who remembers J. Edgar Hoover--or has read of his abuses of the FBI. Even with tight new controls, it's pretty clear that the current administration would have no compunction about bypassing them--if they could.

Hmm. Competent, black, and female. A year ago, those characteristics got people fired. Guess who's absolutely terrified of what will happen in the midterms?

It's important to remember that while many of Nixon's subordinates ended up in prison, there were also Democratic politicians who ended up in prison for corruption at the same time--a very natural consequence of applying the justice system in an even-handed manner.

Actually, policy matters a lot. If the next elected president is not a justice hawk, politicians will dream of being the next Trump--just smarter and longer lasting in office. Democracy can only survive if we insist on the rule of law and equality under it. Accountability is a must!

Looks like scrapple, a traditional Pennsylvania Dutch breakfast (processed) meat. My dad was fond of it.

Death's head images are not limited to NAZIs (the NAZIs weren't known for their artistry, and I know of no NAZI symbolism that wasn't adopted from other sources). What evidence can you cite that he has adopted any elements of NAZI philosophy? Quotations from Mein Kampf, perhaps?

He lived in a small rural town, and grew up with small town kids. If you grew up under conditions where your parents' influence deeply overshadowed that of your friends and other peers, you have my deepest sympathy.

He went to GWU on the GI Bill--not a sign of affluence. True, he went to private school before that, but it is hard to get decent public schooling in small town USA.

From what Wikipedia says, I'd say his family was at best upper middle class--his mother was a small town lawyer and his father a restaurant owner, neither of which are highly lucrative careers. Sullivan, ME, where he grew up has a population of about 1000.

Having seen enough negative campaigns, I tend to reserve judgement on such issues until more data is available. If it were a real issue, I'd expect a wider scandal to appear. That hasn't happened.

If you are highly educated, you would find the job pickings in Maine rather slim--the largest city in Maine is Portland, with a population of just under 70,000. Platner's statements on his tattoo are quite consistent with his background; OTOH, the tattoo is an excellent basis for a smear campaign.

However: he has run an excellent campaign and seems to be trying to get beyond the blue-collar biases he was raised with. He may be the ideal candidate in a rural state like Maine--or as close as could be found.