Elon Musk and Donald Trump Cannot Count Votes

Musk and Trump kneecapped the Speaker of the House without even understanding what they were doing.

On Wednesday, I asked if Mike Johnson could remain the leader/Speaker of a mainly Democratic caucus in the House. It might seem like a weird question to ask if you don’t understand that, despite having fewer House members than the Republicans, the Democrats are in charge of providing the votes to pass our appropriations bills and increases in the debt ceiling to avoid a disastrous national credit default. It has been this way since the beginning of the now expiring 118th Congress, and it will be even more true in the upcoming 119th Congress.

The Republicans don’t like this situation and many of them are in denial that the situation actually exists. Every time a Republican Speaker, whether Kevin McCarthy or Mike Johnson, puts together a mostly Democratic coalition to fund the government or pay our bills on time, there are calls to replace the Speaker. It actually happened to McCarthy, and the Democrats had to step in to save Johnson last May by preventing a vote on his ouster.

The truth is, Johnson has been serving as Speaker at the Democrats’ pleasure ever since. With the debt ceiling expiring at the end of December and funding for the government running out, Johnson had to go hat in hand to the Democrats again to craft a bipartisan continuing resolution that included many concessions to his supposed political opponents. Predictably, many Republicans began to howl in protest, without acknowledging that Johnson has never been able to pass spending bills or pay our debts relying on only Republican votes. His choice has always been to make a deal with the Democrats or preside over a government shutdown and disastrous national credit default.

Shortly after I published my piece on this subject, Elon Musk began posting a series of lies about the deal Johnson had crafted. He falsely claimed the bill funds bioweapon labs. He falsely claimed it includes federal dollars to build the Washington Commanders a new football stadium. He falsely claimed it includes a 40 percent raise for members of Congress. And he asked that the Republicans simply allow the government to shut down until Trump takes office over a month from now, falsely claiming that this would cause no pain.

Donald Trump then joined the chorus, and J.D. Vance jumped in as well. This forced Johnson to pull the bill. When it was pointed out this would cause us to default on our debts and possibly lead to a global economic depression, Trump came up with a simple solution.

President-elect Donald Trump said Thursday that Congress should get rid of the debt ceiling, a day after he came out against a deal reached by congressional lawmakers to fund the government before a shutdown occurs.

In a phone interview with NBC News, Trump said getting rid of the debt ceiling entirely would be the “smartest thing it [Congress] could do. I would support that entirely.”

“The Democrats have said they want to get rid of it. If they want to get rid of it, I would lead the charge,” Trump added.

Trump is correct that many Democrats want to get rid of the debt ceiling. The 14th Amendment to the Constitution states that “The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law…shall not be questioned.” Debating whether or not to pay our public debts is therefore unconstitutional on its face, and there should be no congressional questioning of the issue whatsoever.

But, to avoid a global economic calamity, the debt ceiling still needs to be raised or abolished before the first of January, which can’t happen if Congress is in recess for the holidays. Trump is asking Johnson to push through an abolition by the end of Friday, which would also require the cooperation of the still Democrat-controlled Senate led by Majority Leader Chuck Schumer. But the Democrats aren’t interested in capitulating to this nonsense. They reached a deal with Johnson, and they expect him to keep the deal. After all, the Republicans don’t have to votes to pass anything on their own.

Musk instigated this crisis, seemingly on his own initiative. Josh Marshall, certainly believes Trump is just following along.

Trump has brought Musk into the central circle of power. He’s not only de facto Vice President. When was the last time you saw JD Vance? He’s practically co-president. Musk is erratic, volatile, impulsive, mercurial. He introduces a huge source of unpredictability and chaos into the presidency that for once Trump doesn’t control. See it clearly: Musk did this. Trump thrives on chaos, but his chaos. Not someone else’s chaos.

Trump is following. He’s trying to pretend otherwise but he’s following. And unlike all of Trump’s other bad hires or hires he gets tired of, he can’t just shitcan Musk like all the rest.

It shouldn’t be left unsaid here that there is a tremendous irony involved. Trump tasked Musk with co-leading an advisory group called the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, with Vivek Ramaswamy. Their mission involves slashing  “wasteful government spending” in an effort to get our federal deficit and debt under control. Concern about debt is ostensibly why Musk objected to some provisions of the bipartisan continuing resolution that Johnson crafted, because it included hundreds of billions of dollars in new spending on things like disaster relief and funding for small businesses.

“This is the same old, same old,” [Republican Sen. Josh] Hawley told Fox News host Sean Hannity on Wednesday. “This bill right here would add hundreds of billions of dollars to the deficit…”

But to carry out Musk’s plan to kill the deal, the Republicans not only have to keep the government shut down until January 20th, 2025, they have to abolish the debt ceiling, which for at least 15 years has been the GOP’s favorite blackmail tool for forcing the Democrats to agree in cuts in spending. Historically, even when those concessions are successfully extracted, most Republicans still refuse to vote to raise the debt ceiling, forcing the Democrats to be the responsible legislators. To ask the Republicans to abolish it entirely is asking them to give up this leverage.

Naturally, Trump doesn’t give a shit about debts, deficits or congressional Republicans. In truth, no administration of either party wants a debt ceiling because it just creates headaches and risk. And if he keeps his word and leads the charge to repeal it, that would be a good thing. But, as Marshall suggested, this whole move wasn’t planned by Trump and now he’s just winging it.  He has put Johnson in an impossible position, and now he’s saying Johnson can only survive as Speaker if he does the impossible:

“If the speaker acts decisively, and tough, and gets rid of all of the traps being set by the Democrats, which will economically and, in other ways, destroy our country, he will easily remain speaker,” Trump told Fox News Digital.

Again, Johnson can’t avoid “traps being set by Democrats” if that means paying our bills on time and making concessions to get their votes. No Speaker can do that with a narrow majority and a divided party caucus.

Blaming Johnson for this is just the latest example of the GOP being in denial about the House actually having a functional Democratic majority. In the next Congress, the functional Democratic House majority will actually be larger than in the current one.

Does Musk understand any of this? Does Trump?

Not really. And this is why it’s wishful thinking to believe that Musk and Ramaswamy can do much with their Department of Government Efficiency. What they’re actually trying to do here is the opposite of reducing the deficit. They’re saying that out of one side of their mouth, but from the other side they’re telling the congressional Republicans to accept no check on debt spending during their administration.

In the meantime, Joe Biden is still the president and is responsible for preventing a national credit default and resulting global recession. Will he tell the Democrats to hold firm or ask them to take a deal to abolish the debt ceiling even if it comes with a government shutdown for the remainder of his presidency?

Fun times.

Can Mike Johnson Remain Leader of a Mostly Democratic Caucus?

Once again, the Speaker will use mostly Democrats to avoid a government shutdown. Will it cost him his job in January?

It will be very interesting to see if Mike Johnson can get reelected as Speaker of the House in the next Congress. Like Kevin McCarthy before him, Johnson has actually not been working as the leader of the House GOP but rather as the leader of a mostly Democratic functional majority that works to fund the government and pay our bills on time. As a result, the House Republicans are frustrated. This dynamic cost McCarthy his job and the Democrats had to rescue Mike Johnson last May by making it clear to Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene that they would prevent a vote if she attempted to vacate the Speakership. Why did the Democrats save Johnson?

Well, one answer is that they didn’t want to punish him for avoiding a credit default and government shutdown, but another is simply that he serves them more than he serves his own Republican colleagues. It’s not Johnson’s fault, and it wasn’t McCarthy’s fault. Neither of them had any choice but to rely on the Democrats for votes because they did not have a functional majority without them.

We see this again with the Washington Post reporting that Johnson has reached a deal with the Democrats on “a bipartisan deal to punt a government shutdown deadline into March.” It’s filled with things the Democrats want. The federal government will pay the full cost of repairing the Francis Scott Key bridge in Baltimore. There’s disaster relief and aid to farmers: “$29 billion to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, $21 billion to the Agriculture Department and another $10 billion in additional aid to farmers and ranchers.” The feds have turned over ownership of 177 acres of property around the decrepit RFK Stadium to the District of Columbia so they can redevelop it and attract the Commanders back from Maryland. For Johnson, it was either make these concessions or cause a government shutdown over the holidays.

But the high cost of the disaster aid — and the wins Democrats were able to notch in the bill — upset right-wing hard-liners within the House Republican conference. And to pass the measure before the deadline, Johnson may need support from Democrats to circumvent those members, who in past spending fights have thrown up roadblocks that tilted the government to the verge of a shutdown.

A similar dispute led to the ouster of Johnson’s predecessor, Kevin McCarthy (R-California), and Johnson’s speakership could hang in the balance.

In the next Congress, the Republican majority will be even smaller. Johnson will need almost every Republican member to vote for him if he wants to remain Speaker. He survived through 2024 with an assist from the Democrats largely because Donald Trump decided it wasn’t in his political interests to have a Speaker vacancy during the campaign. It appears he’s satisfied with Johnson’s loyalty and isn’t looking to push him out. And that’s what Johnson will have to rely on if he is going to survive. He’ll probably need Trump to lean on some GOP members who don’t want Johnson to keep the job or who will demand he make impossible promises in return for their vote.

But I’m not certain Trump has enough pull to save Johnson.

This whole dynamic will be the greatest source of power for the Democrats in DC. Yes, they’ll be locked out of the White House and in the minority in Congress, but the congressional Republicans still don’t have the votes on their own to pay our bills on time or to pass the appropriations bills that keep the government operational. The House Democrats are essentially in the majority for this reason. No, they don’t control the committees and they can’t set the agenda, but they have enormous leverage because the Republicans can’t make the government function on their own.

This will remain true even the Republicans choose someone other than Johnson as Speaker. It’s just math. The only majority in Congress that really matters is the one that funds the government and pays the bills, and the GOP is not that majority.

Ideally, the Democrats will force the issue at some point and demand a power sharing agreement and some committee chairs in return for their votes on must-pass legislation. But first we have to see if Johnson can keep going as the Speaker of a mostly Democratic caucus.

Why AOC Lost Her Bid to Lead Oversight

She was a victim of the House Democrats’ seniority system, and maybe a bit of human compassion for her rival who has been diagnosed with cancer.

Traditionally, the House Democrats have used a rigid seniority system to determine who will lead congressional committees. There are two main advantages to this practice and one additional side effect that has a benefit. The first and primary advantage is that it ensures picking committee leadership isn’t a popularity contest or just a matter of who can raise the most money. To become the chair or ranking member of a committee, a House Democrat must put in a lot of time on that committee and gain experience so that they are well prepared. The second advantage is that the rules are clear and well understood. This avoids a lot of conflict and hurt feelings. And a side effect of this system is that it works to the advantage of minority members who tend to serve in safe seats and thereby have an opportunity to gain seniority.

The Republicans use a different process which has shifted over time. I don’t have a copy of their current rules, but in general seniority is only one factor among many. They also limit how many terms someone can serve as the leader of a committee. I think right now the limit is six years, or three terms in office. This avoids staleness, as the committee leadership is constantly churning. It also makes it a bit easier to control members, as they can be easily denied a leadership role if they step out of line. But it comes at a cost of experience and knowledge, and it causes a lot of internal dissension. The main minority group among House Republicans is women, and they have been shut out of top committee positions in the next Congress.

The Democrats’ way has two big and related downsides. The first is that they frequently discover that the most senior member of a committee is no longer physically or mentally up to the job. This is bound to happen to every member eventually, and when it becomes necessary to force someone out of a leadership position for lack of competence, it can be a painful and divisive process. The second downside is that a strict seniority system ensures that younger generations of Democrats are mostly stuck as backbenchers, having little influence over the crafting of legislation. The lack of flexibility in the system can also be a weakness.

The best way to illustrate this weakness is with the the first impeachment of Donald Trump. The chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Jerry Nadler of New York, was seen as so ineffective from a communications standpoint that Nancy Pelosi put the chairman of the Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff of California, in charge of the inquiry. Unsurprisingly, Nadler just lost his bid to remain the ranking member of Judiciary in favor of Jamie Raskin of Maryland. Schiff, who was just elected to the U.S. Senate, and Raskin are very strong communicators, and a party wants to put its best messengers in positions to utilize their talents.

Among the younger generations of Democrats, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez stands out as a strong messenger, and it makes sense to put her in a role where her talents can benefit the party as a whole. One of the most prominent committee roles for a party in the minority is as leader of the House Oversight and Government Affairs Committee. It’s a position formerly held by Raskin. If the Democrats were in the majority in the House, this committee would spend its time harassing the administration and highlighting their incompetence and malfeasance. Since the Democrats are in the minority and cannot control the committee’s agenda, these opportunities will be muted, but could become to the fore after the midterms if the Democrats gain control of the lower chamber. Knowing this, Ocasio-Cortez sought to leapfrog the seniority system and become the ranking member of Oversight, and many Democrats saw an advantage in supporting her bid.

While Pelosi is no longer the leader of the Democrats in the House, she is extremely influential and she successfully argued that leadership of Oversight should remain with the person in the most senior position, Gerry Connolly of Northern Virginia. I suppose you can find things to complain about with any member of Congress, but progressives have no particular reason to be unhappy with Connolly. He’s a strong advocate of the federal workforce, many of whom live in his district. This was a factor in the final vote of the House Democratic Steering and Policy Committee, which reportedly went 34 votes for Connolly and 27 for Ocasio-Cortez.

But things aren’t so simple. Connolly was recently diagnosed with esophageal cancer and, as mistermix at Balloon Juice notes, “the 5 year survival rate for esophageal cancer is 22% (all stages combined). ”

This raises doubt about how well Connolly will be able to fill his messaging role over the next two or four years. Of course, it also makes it more difficult from a human compassion point of view to effectively kick him while he’s down by denying him a position he’s earned through the seniority system.

As for innate talent, Connolly isn’t a bad messenger, but he’s also not a standout. He’s certainly not a star like AOC who boasts an enormous social media following through multiple platforms.

And, in fairness, the Democrats have started to recognize their generational problem. It began when the leadership team of Pelosi, Steny Hoyer and Jim Clyburn, all octogenarians, was replaced in the last Congress by Hakeem Jeffries, Katherine Clark and Pete Aguilar. It has continued in the battle for ranking member positions in the next Congress, where AOC lost, but Angie Craig and Jared Huffman beat out more senior members for the top positions on Agriculture and National Resources, respectively.

For supporters of AOC, this weakening of the seniority system may make her defeat all the more bitter. But signs of greater flexibility are positive. Rather than having a temper tantrum about the result, I’d rather focus on the overall youth movement and the likelihood that Ocasio-Cortez will be in good position to lead Oversight if and when the Democrats retake the House and the chairman will have actual power to direct the committee.

I wish Connolly good health. He’s a good dude and health permitting he is capable of doing a better than adequate job. But if the day comes when he can’t perform his duties anymore, AOC will be waiting in the wings.

Episode 19 of the Progress Pondcast Features My Brother Phil

Fifty years of weak antitrust policies have hurt the Democrats with working class voters. How can they win them back?

Brendan and I are honored to host my brother Phillip Longman for a big discussion on where the Democrats go from here, with a big focus on the hollowing out of Main Street America. Phil, who is an expert on monopolies,  has worked for publications like U.S. News & World Report, Florida Trend, and is the senior editor of the Washington Monthly. He currently works for the Open Markets Institute, a Washington DC think tank he helped to found that focuses on using “competition policy to build stronger democracies, more just and equitable societies, more innovative and sustainable economies, and a more secure and peaceful world.”

If you want more than a discussion of whether the Democrats lost due to social issues or economic issues related to free trade, this is the podcast for you. We cover a lot of ground, covering competition policies from the Civil War, the Robber Baron Era, the Progressive Era, and up into the 1970’s when Jimmy Carter, Teddy Kennedy and Ralph Nader teamed up to destroy what had made the America Dream accessible up to that point.

When Reagan removed meaningful antitrust enforcement, the game was up. We’ve been on a slow road to losing the Rust Belt and the working class ever since, and now it’s spread to the working class of all races, including in blue states and cities.

What can we do now? And who can do it? To find that out, you have to give us a listen. You can find the episode on Apple, Spotify, IHeartRadio, and Amazon, among other places.

We could also really use some support through our Patreon page to help us keep this project going. The importance of people supporting left-wing podcasters and other influencers is another subject of this episode. Simply put, the billionaires aren’t going to give us Wingnut Welfare or a fair hearing in the papers and on the cable television networks they own. It’s up to us to support our own talent if we want to compete against the Joe Rogans and Steve Bannons on the world.

If you can give, please do, but I hope you give a listen either way.

What the City of Deir ez-Zor Means For the Future of Syria

The city on the Euphrates has a history of resisting outsider occupation, and it’s in the news for a couple reasons today.

There are several ways to romanize Deir ez-Zor, a city on the Euphrates River in eastern Syria. It’s in the news right now for a couple of reasons. The first is that one of its citizens, Syrian activist Mazen Al-Hamada, was found tortured to death in the Harasta military hospital in the Damascus suburbs, and he received a well-publicized and attended funeral on Thursday where he was praised as a hero of the revolution.

Al-Hamada was part of the early anti-Assad protests in 2011 in Deir ez-Zor, and he was detained and tortured twice before gaining asylum in the Netherlands. From there, he became an outspoken critic of the Assad regime and advocate for political prisoners. Sadly, he was lured back to Syria with the promise of the release of some prisoners only to be detained at the airport and disappeared until his badly ravaged body was found several days ago.

The city of his birth has an interesting and troubled history. The Ottomans churned through governors of the region and during the late stages of their rule, it was the end point for Armenian deportations, and tens of thousands of Armenians were murdered there. After World War One, it was first occupied by the British and then by the French, both of which were forced out by insurgencies. During the Syrian Civil War, it was held for a time by ISIS, and then by the regime, and finally by the Kurds.

The Middle East Monitor reported on Wednesday that the Kurds have fled the city and are being attacked on the outskirts by the same Turkey-backed  Hay’at Tahrir Al-Sham forces that drove Assad from power.

Syria’s new government has announced the liberation of Deir ez-Zor city from Kurdish militias in the eastern province, as the former opposition continues to capture more territory throughout the country.

According to a telegram post by Hay’at Tahrir Al-Sham’s (HTS) Directorate of Military Operations, Commander Hassan Abdul Ghani stated that “our fighters continue to advance in the districts and settlements of Deir ez-Zor province after taking control of the city centre, as well as the western and eastern countryside”.

Earlier this week, the late Deir ez-Zor Military Council – formerly part of the Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces’ (SDF) coalition in that eastern province – dramatically abandoned the SDF, announcing its departure from its ranks.

Unrest by local Syrians in Deir ez-Zor then pushed the Kurdish militias out of the main city, with the SDF deciding to withdraw from the area. That consequently made way for the new Syrian HTS-led interim government to move into the city, announcing its liberation from years of being held by the SDF and being fought over by various factions.

Following those developments, HTS-led security forces are reported to currently be carrying out an offensive against the SDF in other areas and the countryside of Deir ez-Zor province, in events which appear to be the result of the new Syrian government’s aim to capture and unify the entirety of the country.

In the north and north-east of Syria, where the heartland of the Syrian Kurdish militias lies, the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army (SNA) has also been advancing against Kurdish positions.

It’s clear that the remote city has an ornery population that resists rule by outsiders. It’s mostly Sunni Arab, with a sizable Armenian remnant, so it’s not surprising they were eager to be rid of both the Alawite regime and occupation by the Kurds.

Yet, even as the Kurds are pressed back to their traditional homeland by forces of the new government, they are trying to be conciliatory.

The semi-autonomous Kurdish administration that holds swathes of Syria’s northeast said today that it will adopt the three-starred independence flag used by the opposition, after rebels toppled longtime president Bashar al-Assad.

The Kurdish authority said in a statement it has “decided to raise the Syrian [independence] flag on all councils, institutions, administrations and facilities affiliated with the Autonomous Administration,” describing the flag as a “symbol of this new stage, as it expresses the aspirations of the Syrian people towards freedom, dignity and national unity.”

Yet, they are still under attack. I tell this story primarily to demonstrate how complicated and difficult it is to understand the dynamics and history of Syria, and what this might mean for predicting and navigating the future.

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We’re All in a Big Yellow Taxi

The American people are not in the mood to uphold our institutions and we won’t know what we’ve got until it’s gone.

Here is something to consider from a Monmouth University poll:

Trump suggested during the presidential campaign that he could suspend some laws and constitutional provisions to go after political enemies in his second term. The public is divided on whether this is something he will seriously do (48%) or if it is more of an exaggeration (47%). Most Democrats take these statements seriously (77%) while most Republicans tend to see them as an exaggeration (71%). Republicans are somewhat less likely to takes these statements seriously now (21%) then they were six months ago (33% in June).

If Trump did suspend some laws and constitutional provisions, 52% of the public would be bothered a lot by this. This number is down from 65% who felt this way in June. Those who say they would be bothered a lot by this ranges from 77% of Democrats (down from 86% in June) to 55% of independents (down from 68%) and just 23% of Republicans (down from 41%).

You would think that barring some extreme threat to the country’s national security, 100 percent of Americans would be “bothered a lot” by a president suspending “some laws and constitutional provisions to go after political enemies.”

Yet, barely over three in four Democrats say they would have a problem with it. That’s identical to the percentage of Democrats who say they take the threat seriously. On the other hand, only about 1 in 5 Republicans are similarly alarmed, and fewer than 1 in 4 would care if he follows through and violates the laws and constitution to settle scores.

The American people just don’t seem to be in a mood to uphold much of anything, whether its norms against murder in the streets, the independence of the Justice Department, disqualifying politicians who commit business fraud, rape, and coup attempts, or the importance of upholding the Constitution.

I would never suggest that living in America has been a paradise, but I think this really is a case of people not knowing what they have until it’s gone. If there’s widespread rage on the frontend here, there will be another kind of outrage on the backend when people see what it’s like when everything breaks  and radicals take away the things they take for granted.

This is what’s coming, mostly metaphorically, of course:

They took all the trees, put ’em in a tree museum
And they charged the people a dollar and a half just to see ’em

But the real challenge here is that someone has to preserve our right to vote out these people when we grow disenchanted. That’s where the importance of the Constitution really matters, because if no one will enforce the law there’s no way to ensure we’ll have another free and fair election.

Heroes may be required.

Frightening and Fascinating Developments in Syria

There are two immediate advantages in post-Assad Syria that were not enjoyed in post-Saddam Iraq. The first is that the people trying to maintain order in Syria are actually Syrians rather than Americans and Brits, and they understand their society. The second is that they have the example of all the mistakes the Americans and Brits made in Iraq. We can already see the difference in how Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) forces are working to maintain government services rather than engaging in wholesale de-Baathification.

As The Soufan Center notes, there’s a notable public relations effort to project a moderate image. The HTS has talked about respecting religious minorities, including Assad’s Alawite sect providing that they separate themselves from the regime. The leader of HTS, has dropped his nom de guerre of Abu Mohammed al-Jolani in favor of his birth name, Ahmed al-Shara. He has also changed his wardrobe “to a combination of more well-coiffed Western attire and military uniforms.”

The change in name is significant for another reason. The Arabic word for the Golan Heights is Jawlān, and he chose the fighting name “Mohammed al-Jolani” to signify his family’s historic roots in the Golan. Al-Shara was born in Saudi Arabia and raised in Damascus, but most likely considers himself as a displaced person from Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights. Significantly, as soon as al-Shara arrived in Damascus, the Israelis moved into and past the demilitarized zone in the Golan. They justified this as a purely defensive measure, but it was accompanied by a very heavy bombing campaign throughout the country which destroyed Syria’s navy and hit many military installations, including but not limited to suspected chemical weapons sites. This is an example of opportunism, as Israel exploits a moment of chaos to diminish Syria’s military capabilities in a way that would have been hugely risky during Assad’s time in power. But it’s doing nothing to create conditions for some kind of reset with the nascent government forming in Damascus.

Outside of Moscow and Tehran, almost no one is lamenting the fall of Assad, but a takeover by Sunni Islamists with ties to ISIS and al-Qaeda isn’t reassuring. And the sectarian change in power is the most significant thing here. Just as Iraq flipped in an instant from a Sunni-dominated country to a Shi’a dominated one when Saddam was toppled, the overthrow of Assad has broken Iran’s dominance in Syria. It also has huge consequences for Russia which is reliant on their Syrian naval base and large air base.

Another hugely significant development is the death of Baathism eliminates a secular Sunni alternative to Sunni fundamentalism. Baathism’s intellectual father, Michel Aflaq, was a Christian. The Assad family’s Alawite sect is considered non-Muslim by many, including especially by Sunni fundamentalists. For this reason, Baathism has always had a bit if a legitimacy problem. By aligning with the hardline Shi’a fundamentalists that control Iran, the Assad regime partially resolved this weakness, especially as Iran took a more active and combative anti-Israel role than the Sunni Arab regimes.

What these changes mean is that Syria has an opportunity to take the mantle of resistance to Israel from Iran, but to do it from a Sunni Arab point of view. This is more natural for a host of reasons, including that Syria is mostly Sunni, as are the Palestinians.

This is not what the leaders in Egypt and Jordan want to see, as they value their peace treaties with Israel. It’s also not what Saudi Arabia wants to see, as they’ve clearly been more interested in recent years in normalizing relations with Israel and attracting western investment, the World Cup, etc.

The war in Gaza has made accommodation and peace with Israel problematic for every Arab country, and this is something Syria can exploit to gain street credibility and allegiance. But it isn’t their only choice. After more than a decade of devastating war, Syria isn’t in a position to offer much resistance, and could benefit from international good will to rebuild and repatriate some of the millions who have fled the country.

It might be too optimistic to even posit that the civil war in Syria will end. Outside actors may be too invested in chaos to permit it. Turkey, which sponsored the overthrow of Assad by HTS, wants to crush Kurdish controlled areas. Saudis may want to shift anti-israel jihadi activity to Syria to give cover to their overall strategy of normalization with Israel, and to pressure for some concessions from the Israelis to the Palestinians. Iran may use what’s left of Hezbollah to cause problems. And, of course, Israel may promote divisions to sustain weakness.

But there is at least some chance that Syria can be stabilized if the new government can get a moment to breath and is serious about creating an ecumenical society that resembles what Syria, at its best, offered before the civil war began. I don’t think it will be secular in outlook, though. I believe it will be very religiously conservative and ultimately Sunni-sectarian.

Lebanon is another complete wildcard in this. It has always been dominated by Syria, but never by a Sunni government with this type of orientation. It has to be disorienting.

All these developments are both fascinating and frightening. Most Syrians are really happy about the fall of Assad. I hope they have reason to feel that way for more than a brief period. And I hope that’s true for the rest of us, too.

Server/Database Problems

We are doing a complete rebuild of the database and server.

We’ve been suffering pretty catastrophic database problems for the last few weeks, and we’ve had to do several restores that have erased both articles and comments. Nothing has worked to fix the problems so now we are doing a complete rebuild. It’s quite possible that the server will become disconnected to the database again one or more times before the rebuild is completed, so please be patient and maybe save any comments you care about so you can repost them later.

Part of the problem is that GoDaddy bought out our server company and they provide very limited access and service compared to what we had before, which makes it very hard to identify problems and work on fixes.

Everything is backed up now, so at least we won’t lose our history, but we’re still not sure we have the wherewithal to fix this thing. If not, we’ll figure out next steps, but I don’t have the budget to hire a team to do this.

One way to help out is to visit our Patreon page and become a podcast donor.

I really apologize for the inconvenience. It’s annoying me because I have a long list of things I want to write about, but it’s hard to commit when it feels like it will just get erased in a crash and I’ll have to repost it.

Wish us luck!

I Would Have Lost All Respect for Biden If He Didn’t Pardon His Son

Critics of the president are either seeking political advantage once again or are simply dunderheads.

I would have lost all respect for President Joe Biden if he stood by and allowed his son Hunter to go to prison. On Sunday, he made sure that would not happen by issuing a broad and blanket pardon for any offense Hunter may have committed since 2014. In doing so, he rendered moot the sentencing his son was due to receive on December 12 for his trumped-up conviction on federal gun charges and on December 16 for federal tax evasion charges.

If there’s a valid criticism of this decision, it’s really only that it broke a commitment Biden made not to pardon Hunter. If you want to say he lied, I suppose you can. Personally, I never believed Biden would allow his son to be incarcerated, particularly on the gun charges.

I think the most important thing to keep in mind about Hunter is that he is a recovering addict who has maintained his sobriety for over five years.

…Hunter Biden said he had “admitted and taken responsibility for my mistakes during the darkest days of my addiction — mistakes that have been exploited to publicly humiliate and shame me and my family for political sport.”

“Despite all of this, I have maintained my sobriety for more than five years because of my deep faith and the unwavering love and support of my family and friends,” he added. “In the throes of addiction, I squandered many opportunities and advantages. In recovery we can be given the opportunity to make amends where possible and rebuild our lives if we never take for granted the mercy that we have been afforded. I will never take the clemency I have been given today for granted and will devote the life I have rebuilt to helping those who are still sick and suffering.”

In his statement, the president made reference to this:

Without aggravating factors like use in a crime, multiple purchases, or buying a weapon as a straw purchaser, people are almost never brought to trial on felony charges solely for how they filled out a gun form. Those who were late paying their taxes because of serious addictions, but paid them back subsequently with interest and penalties, are typically given non-criminal resolutions. It is clear that Hunter was treated differently.

It’s important to understand what Biden is saying here because he’s right. This isn’t example of the rich and powerful getting lenient treatment, but the exact opposite. An average person would never have been prosecuted for failing to disclose their substance abuse problem on a gun form. If that were routinely charged, half of MAGA world would be in federal prison. And people who run into financial difficulties due to addiction are not usually sent to prison for tax offenses if they’ve gotten clean and made full restitution. The reason the book was thrown at Hunter was because of unrelenting pressure from Republicans who showed no mercy or compassion or forgiveness to Hunter in their zeal to gain a political advantage.

Under these circumstances, Biden would be a terrible father and person if he put some supposedly high-minded principle over protecting his son, who is still a fragile and damaged person struggling to live the right way.

Anyone who argues otherwise is either seeking a political advantage once more or simply a dunderhead.

Episode 18 of The Progress Pondcast is Live

Giuliani is broke, Maggie Haberman can’t keep up with Trump’s shitty cabinet picks, and Brendan gets dragged back onto social media.

In our first podcast since the devastating reelection of Trump (available at Spotify, Amazon, IHeartRadio and Apple), Brendan and I try to cheer everyone up at Rudy Giuliani’s expense. Then we turn our attention to Trump’s announced cabinet and the public’s inexplicable positive reaction. And we finish up on a positive note by discussing the potential of BlueSky to serve as a tool that can save both the traditional media and left-wing content producers.

We encourage your likes, follows, and subscribes wherever you get your podcasts— The best way to support our work financially is on Patreon.