Pondering the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news media and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Pondering the Pundits”.

Follow us on Twitter @StarsHollowGzt

Eugene Robinson: Thanks to Biden, the U.S. has gotten back into the fight against climate change

The Biden administration can’t stop global warming alone. But leadership matters.

The world’s richest and most powerful country is back in the fight against climate change. That is hugely important news for everyone already on the planet, and for our grandchildren yet to come.

The executive orders President Biden signed Wednesday will not, by themselves, solve the climate crisis. The high-powered White House team he put in charge of climate policy — led by Climate Coordinator Gina McCarthy and Climate Envoy John F. Kerry, the first people to hold these new roles — has no magic wand to make greenhouse gases go away. But we now have a better chance of avoiding worst-case environmental ruin, and we have a better chance of seeing the U.S. economy thrive in the inevitable shift toward clean energy. [..]

Biden promises a return to sanity. One of his first official acts last week was to rejoin the Paris climate agreement, which sets voluntary targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. On Wednesday, he signed executive orders designed to make climate an “essential element” of foreign policy and national security. Among a host of other measures, Biden has declared a moratorium on new oil and natural gas leases on federal lands, ordered federal agencies to procure electricity from renewable sources and decreed that the government will buy a fleet of zero-emission vehicles.

None of that will begin to solve the global climate crisis — but the leadership it represents will help more than skeptics realize.

Karen Tumulty: The GOP struck a bad bargain. That’s how it got stuck with Marjorie Taylor Greene.

The Republicans’ unwillingness to confront extremist forces within their party is not only unseemly but dangerous.

Donald Trump has departed Washington, but he has left behind a new set of rules for Republicans. One of them is that words and deeds, no matter how reckless or disconnected from the truth, carry no consequences.

Which is how the party wound up with Marjorie Taylor Greene, a dangerous loon whom the voters of Georgia’s 14th Congressional District decided to send to the U.S. House. [..]

But the predictable outcome, given the general mind-set of Republicans these days, is that such a drive would only elevate her as a martyr and bring wails of “cancel culture” from the prime-time pundits on Fox News.

She already is styling herself as a fever-swamp version of Joan of Arc. During the House debate on Trump’s impeachment — a proceeding that was nationally televised — Greene delivered her remarks while wearing a mask emblazoned with the word “CENSORED,” in protest of Twitter’s decision to suspend her for 12 hours for posting incendiary and false material about the election.

The real blame here, however, should rest with Republican leaders.

Amanda Marcotte: Forget about a GOP crack-up: Republicans rally around a defeated Trump because they understand power

Sorry, but the GOP won’t tear themselves apart — they’re too attached to power to let Trump and QAnon break them up

File it under too good to be true: The much-anticipated great Republican crack-up is not coming.

Last weekend, the Washington Post ran a story headlined, “Trump jumps into a divisive battle over the Republican Party — with a threat to start a ‘MAGA Party.'” It focused on the internal battle between the (relatively few) Republicans who are angry about Donald Trump inciting an insurrection on the Capitol and the more numerous Republicans who are gung-ho about this turn towards fascism and cannot wait to push it further. This followed earlier reporting about a “[b]itter split GOP” promising “Republicans in open warfare” and similar reporting from the New York Times promising that “bitter infighting underscores the deep divisions” in the GOP. [..]

I was skeptical, believing as I do that there are three inevitabilities in life: Death, taxes, and that Republicans are far too attached to power to demobilize.

They may believe that there’s an international cabal of blood-drinking Satanist pedophiles, but Republicans aren’t so dumb as to think that there’s anything to be gained from third parties or withholding their votes altogether. That level of self-defeating stupidity is a solidly progressive flaw. Republicans know that power means winning elections and winning elections means sticking together. That is how it always is and always shall be, or at least until they can end this whole “holding elections” business altogether.

Elizabeth Rosenthal: Yes, It Matters That People Are Jumping the Vaccine Line

When hospital administrators and politicians’ spouses get immunized before people more at risk, it undermines confidence in the system.

The Biden administration’s much-needed national strategy to end the Covid-19 pandemic includes plans to remedy the chaotic vaccination effort with “more people, more places, more supply.” The Federal Emergency Management Agency will open more vaccination sites, the government will buy more doses and more people will be immunized. Still, by all estimates the demand for vaccines will far exceed the supply for months to come.

For weeks Americans have watched those who are well connected, wealthy or crafty “jump the line” to get a vaccine, while others are stuck, endlessly waiting on hold to get an appointment, watching sign-up websites crash or loitering outside clinics in the often-futile hope of getting a shot.

To eliminate this knock-out-your-neighbor race to score a vaccine, the administration needs to find ways to build trust in the system. It will take more than “more people, more places, more supply” to end the Darwinian competition and restore confidence and order.

Michael Tomasky: Why a Trump Third Party Would Be a Boon for Democrats

We really have room for only two major parties at a time in the United States.

Former President Donald Trump reportedly wants to form a new political party. For the first time in my sentient life, I say: Proceed, Mr. Trump. As he may or may not know, what he would almost certainly accomplish is to ensure that Democrats held the White House and the House of Representatives for as long as his party existed. [..]

One should never say never on these matters. The Whigs split in the early 1850s when their internal divisions over slavery became unbridgeable, which helped lead to that decade’s multiparty mayhem. That “mayhem” led to the rise of a new two-party system and, in 1860, elected the savior of the Republic. So it has happened. Most recently, about 165 years ago. (The Bull Moose Party, by the way, fizzled out in six years.)

But Mr. Trump would basically be creating a party that would make Democratic dominance much more likely.

He probably doesn’t know all this. Or maybe he does, and still wants to do it. If the latter, it would be what the Republicans so richly deserve for embracing someone who wasn’t really one of them to begin with and who practically has shaken our democracy to its core with their acquiescence.

Pondering the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news media and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Pondering the Pundits”.

Follow us on Twitter @StarsHollowGzt

Paul Krugman: Pandemic Rescue: It’s ‘And’ Not ‘Or’

Why you shouldn’t nitpick over the details.

President Biden is proposing a large relief package to deal with the continuing fallout from the coronavirus. The package is expansive, as it should be. But it is, predictably, facing demands that it be scaled back. Which, if any, of these demands have some validity?

We can discount opposition from Republican leaders who have suddenly decided, after years of enabling deficits under Trump, that federal debt is a terrible thing. We’ve seen this movie before, during the Obama years: Republicans oppose economic aid not because they believe it will fail but because they fear it might succeed, both helping Democrats’ political prospects and legitimizing an expanded role for government.

But there are also some good-faith objections to parts of the Biden proposal, coming from Democrats like Joe Manchin and progressive economic commentators like Larry Summers. What these commentators object to, mainly, are plans for broadly distributed “stimulus checks” (they aren’t checks and they aren’t stimulus, but never mind): payments of $1400 to many families.

I’m posting this note to explain why I believe that these objections are wrong. To be more precise, I’d argue that these critics are giving the right answer to the wrong question.

Amanda Marcotte: The myth of bipartisanship: Will a fully radicalized GOP finally blow up D.C.’s silliest fantasy?

Republicans voted to back Trump’s violent insurrection — there’s no use wasting time trying to compromise with them

Well, now it’s official: On Tuesday, nine out of ten Republican senators blessed Donald Trump’s efforts at sending a mob to violently overthrow democracy. Despite the very real threat to their lives posed by the insurrection at the Capitol on January 6, 45 out of 50 Republican senators, answering the call of the ever-showboating Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, voted against proceeding with an impeachment trial of Trump for the crime of inciting an insurrection. This, even though Republicans know Trump is guilty. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., even previously admitted that Trump “provoked” the riot that led to 5 deaths and unhinged mobs roaming the Capitol looking to murder prominent politicians like Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and then-Vice President Mike Pence. [..]

Republicans’ consistent support of Trump really should be putting more of a damper on the mewlings about compromise with the GOP from centrist Democratic holdouts like Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona and Sen. Joe Manchin. These two senators have been in the news lately because of their stated opposition to ending the filibuster. Even President Joe Biden, despite his welcome interest in forging ahead with a series of progressive executive orders, has expressed concerns about eliminating the filibuster, which gives the Republican minority veto power over any meaningful legislation.

The idea that that filibuster is some marvelous tool of bipartisanship has long been a childish fantasy. Republicans have manipulated it so they can pass their priorities — tax cuts and federal judicial appointments — with a straight majority vote, yet it magically remains in place as an insurmountable obstacle for Democratic priorities, such as ethics reform and a minimum wage hike.

Moreover, the notion that a Democratic majority can “work together” with a Republican minority is a cruel joke.

Chauncey DeVega: Trump’s horror show isn’t nearly over: The coup wasn’t defeated, only slowed down

Trump is both a symptom and a cause of America’s terrible ailment. Whether or not he returns, the disease is real

Monsters are real. One does not defeat them by hiding. They are not defeated by denying that they exist. Throwing them down the memory hole offers little if any safety. To vanquish the monsters of this world requires hard work and eternal vigilance.

Donald Trump proved himself to be one of the worst presidents in American history — if not the very worst. His “movement” was and remains a force of prodigious civic evil. To call Trump’s political cult “deplorable” is, quite honestly, to elevate it above its real standing.

Last week, Joe Biden finally became president of the United States and the Democrats, at least on paper, maintain a tenuous hold on both houses of Congress.

But despite the historical verdict of the 81 million Americans who voted for Biden and the Democrats, Trump is likely to remain a fixture in American life and politics for years to come. Trump’s followers do not understand that they were beaten in the November election, and quite likely will never accept that. The Republican Party and its voters remain in thrall to Donald Trump. Ultimately, a force that does not know it has been defeated will not stop fighting.

Greg Sargent: The hidden way Biden is attacking the future of Trumpism

As the GOP dissolves into Trumpist conspiracy-mongering, a new Biden vision takes shape.

The plight of Sen. Josh Hawley, Republican of Missouri, has devolved into a cautionary tale with an unmistakable moral: If you want to become the primary keeper of the flame of Trumpism, you risk getting badly burned.

Hawley hoped to become chief steward of a respectable version of Donald Trump’s “conservative populism.” But, given Trump’s hold over GOP voters, Hawley gambled that leading the former president’s effort to overturn the election in Congress would secure instant national prominence. Ever since that effort incited the insurrection, Hawley has been furiously working to erase its stain.

This tale demonstrates how Trump’s continued grip on the GOP is complicating the salvaging of a constructive agenda from the wreckage of the Trump presidency. Instead of carrying out that mission, Hawley is gaining scrutiny for his ridiculous defenses of his enabling of an unprecedented assault on our democracy grounded in QAnon-level crackpottery.

But this Trump effect is also creating a big opening — one that President Biden and Democrats, intentionally or not, are already rushing to fill, with potentially lasting consequences for our politics.

Pondering the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news media and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Pondering the Pundits”.

Follow us on Twitter @StarsHollowGzt

Paul Krugman: Helping Kids Is a Very Good Idea

Republicans won’t support the Democrats’ proposal, but they should.

Some things about American politics are completely predictable, even in a time of insurrection and QAnon craziness. Anyone who has been paying attention over the past decade knew that as soon as a Democrat took the White House, Republicans would instantly do another 180-degree turn on budget deficits.

Remember, the G.O.P. went from hyperventilating about debt as an existential threat during the Obama years to complete indifference about deficits under Donald Trump. Surely nobody is surprised to see Republicans immediately revert to deficit hysteria now that Joe Biden is president.

Why are Republicans suddenly peddling debt phobia again? Their usual argument is that federal debt is a burden on future generations; I and others have spent considerable time trying to explain that this is bad economics.

But leave the economics of debt aside. Shouldn’t politicians who claim to be terribly worried about the future of America’s children support, you know, actually helping America’s children today?

That’s not a hypothetical question. Democrats are reportedly working on legislation that would offer monthly payments to most American families with children, and could, among other things, cut child poverty roughly in half.

Amanda Marcotte: Trump’s coup didn’t fail just from incompetence — credit the progressive activists who stopped him

To defeat the GOP’s assault on democracy, it’s critical for everyday voters to understand that they do have power

Last week, Donald Trump finally left the White House, after two and a half months of trying to steal the election — which culminated in Trump inciting a violent insurrection at the Capitol. Even before he sent a mob to violently interrupt the certification of Joe Biden’s win on January 6, Trump’s efforts to overturn the election were relentless to the point of being uncountable: Dozens of lawsuits (which were nearly all struck down), pressure campaigns on local election boards and state legislators, an extortion scheme against Senate Republicans, threats against state officials, demands that then-Vice President Mike Pence illegally invalidate the election, and even meetings to explore the possibility of a military coup.

In the face of all this, a narrative has shaped up: Trump’s failure to pull off a coup was largely due to his own shortcomings.

It’s a narrative that started early, with Max Boot of the Washington Post opining shortly after the election that he’s “never been more grateful for President Trump’s incompetence,” because he “can’t even organize a coup d’état properly.” It culminated in Adam Serwer of the Atlantic arguing that Trump’s “assault was most often futile, almost always buffoonish.”

To be clear, no one is saying that Trump’s efforts were inconsequential, just because he failed to steal the election. Even Ross Douthat, who was most devoted to the “incompetence” narrative, admitted in his New York Times column that it was bad that a violent mob had descended on the Capitol, killing a police officer and coming perilously close to getting their hands on the lawmakers they were threatening. As Ed Kilgore wrote last week at the New Yorker, the lesson we all learned is that there were “some moments of real peril,” and Trump got distressingly close to pulling it off at times. Still, the focus on why Trump failed is largely on his own inadequacies and bad planning — Kilgore suggests he could have succeeded with “better timing and better lawyers” — and some lucky breaks, such as the quick thinking of some Capitol police who saved lawmakers from the insurrectionists.

Michelle Goldberg: Please, Biden, Try for 2 Million Shots a Day

The administration’s vaccine plan isn’t ambitious enough.

Donald Trump’s administration overpromised on coronavirus vaccines. In November, his secretary of health and human services said there would be 40 million doses available by the end of the 2020; he was off by about a month. Trump himself promised 100 million doses in that same period. Everything he and his team said was a sales pitch, designed to foster the false impression that the pandemic they let burn out of control was on the cusp of ending.

There’s a growing consensus that Joe Biden’s administration has done the exact opposite. “Biden’s early approach to virus: Underpromise, overdeliver,” says an Associated Press headline. In December, when Biden pledged 100 million vaccine shots in 100 days, some experts thought it was a reach. But now that the United States is already vaccinating a bit more than a million people a day, that figure is far too modest.

Biden seemed to acknowledge that on Monday, telling reporters that the United States could get to 150 million shots in 100 days. Even that, however, is not enough.

Robert Reich: Don’t believe the anti-Trump hype – corporate sedition still endangers America

CEOs only acted after the Capitol attack because Democrats took power. Their political dominance must be reduced

The sudden lurch from Trump to Biden is generating vertigo all over Washington, including the so-called fourth branch of government – chief executives and their army of lobbyists.

Notwithstanding Biden’s ambitious agenda, dozens of giant corporations have said they will no longer donate to the 147 members of Congress who objected to the certification of Biden electors on the basis of Trump’s lies about widespread fraud, which rules out most Republicans on the Hill. [..]

Give me a break. For years, big corporations have been assaulting democracy with big money, drowning out the voices and needs of ordinary Americans and fueling much of the anger and cynicism that opened the door to Trump in the first place.

David Litt: Republicans will try to create an ‘ethics’ trap for Democrats. Don’t fall for it

Republicans will try to create an ‘ethics’ trap for Democrats. Don’t fall for it

A press secretary who tells the truth. An independent justice department that respects the rule of law. A president who doesn’t tweet conspiracy theories in the wee hours of the morning. After four dispiriting years and one near-death experience for American democracy, it would be comforting to conclude that nature is healing. Our political guardrails held. The Trump Era was nothing more than a temporary blip.

But such complacency would be a terrible mistake. What we’re seeing at the dawn of the Biden presidency is not the reestablishment of norms, but the establishment of double standards.

Yes, it’s commendable that the incoming Democratic administration pledges to behave responsibly, but it’s far from guaranteed that future Republican administrations will do the same. In fact, as things currently stand, it’s practically guaranteed that they won’t.