To: EAW (Memo 1)

Re:  Thinning the Herd.

Senator Warren,

Congratulations on a thoroughly impressive performance at the June 26th debate.  You did everything you had to do to maintain and enhance your standing in the polls.  You were fortunate, I think, in your draw.  The June 27th debate was far less suited to your style.  As the only front-runner on the stage Wednesday night, you dominated the field without having to raise your voice.  An excellent start!

After the debate, and tonight's campaign contribution reporting deadline, some of your competitors will begin to find themselves wondering how much longer they can go on.  A consistent 0% to 1% in the polls can be discouraging, especially as the DNC's criteria for participation in future debates tighten.

Given these considerations, as I see it, your best move would be to start finding ways to "thin the herd".  It might be that you could, yourself, persuade one or more of your rivals to drop out of the race and endorse your candidacy.

Obviously, this would have to be done with great tact.  Egos are involved.  Ambitious hopes must be surrendered.  And of course, you certainly don't want to appear presumptuous.  Still, as and where you have the personal contacts, it might be worthwhile to find opportunities to seek the support of some of your rivals over the next month or so.

I chose that word, rivals, for a very specific reason.  I assume you have read Doris Kearns Goodwin's celebrated Team of Rivals, about Lincoln's decision to invite most of his Republican rivals into his Cabinet.  I think it might be useful to begin working references to that book into your stump speech.

You might say that you have been very impressed with the caliber of the Democratic field - both those who debated and some who (like Senator Bullock and Congressman Moulton) were excluded.  And that you think - regardless of who ends up as the nominee - the next Democratic President would do well to follow Lincoln's example.  There are a number of candidates whose understanding of specific issues, and passion for those issues, would make them invaluable in the next Cabinet.

A case in point would be Governor Jay Inslee of Washington.  He is justly passionate about climate change.  He's quite articulate on the subject.  He has been repeatedly rebuffed by the DNC in his pursuit of a debate specifically dedicated to that issue.  By now, the Governor probably knows that he is not going to be the nominee, but he won't want to drop out until he's assured that this issue is placed front-and-center in this campaign - right through November, 2020 - and that the next President places it at the top of her agenda.

Perhaps someone on your team has contacts with someone on the Governor's staff.  Perhaps you could find a way to talk with him, one-on-one, to assure him that you would value his input, if he decides to get out of the race.  Perhaps there are gestures you could make in that direction - such as advocating that the EPA be made a Cabinet department.  His support would be helpful in Washington, a Super Tuesday state.  It might also create momentum for other candidates to consider dropping out to join your team.

And, of course, your team could learn something from him about specific environmental policies that could become part of your growing program.

To be sure, this strategy - finding ways to encourage the 0% and 1% candidates to endorse you - is not a general prescription.  You are better off with some candidates remaining in the field, for a number of reasons.

You should be happy, for example, for Joe Biden to stay around for as long as he cares to.  Despite his lead in the polls, he isn't going to be the nominee.  As you and other viable candidates become better known, his support will bleed away.  But the longer he stays in, the longer he keeps the old-school "third way" Democrats from consolidating behind some perceived "moderate" who is more viable.

Why do I assert so boldly that Joe won't be the nominee?  Because he's tired.  He lacks passion and vision.  He reminds me of Dick Gephardt in 2004.  I was in New Hampshire during the last week of 2003 - volunteering for Howard Dean - and I saw Gephardt work a bagel shop in Corcord, NH.  It was clear he was doing a victory lap - enjoying a "last hurrah".  He was the past, not the future.  Same with old Joe.

You should also be extremely happy for Bernie to stick around, even though his supporters would probably migrate to you if he dropped out..  My guess is that Bernie will long retain the support of his true believers, but that he will have a hard time winning significant new support.  He has no new ideas.  No new rhetoric, for that matter.  He's like a classic rock band on tour - still a great show, but basically all you're going to hear is his greatest hits.

Still, as long as Bernie stays in, he does two things for you.  First, makes you appear more moderate.  (As you are, of course, but you know what they say about appearances and reality in politics.)  Second - if you'll pardon my candor here, ma'am - he makes you look younger.  In future debates, you'll probably end up standing next to Mayor Pete at some point.  Well, he makes us all look ancient.  Can't help that.  But for now, Bernie is great for you.

Anyway, neither Biden nor Bernie is your real challenge.  Barring the unexpected, your ultimate competition will likely be Kamala Harris and Mayor Pete.  Joe will fade, slowly, but inexorably.  Bernie won't gain new support.  Cory Booker might pick up some adherents, as might Julian Castro.  We'll see.  Still, I think you wind up in a three-horse race coming out of Iowa and New Hampshire.

So - if you'll excuse the presumption - your game plan for now is to continue doing what you're doing.  Talk up your well-researched, well-defined plans.  (Not too many more of these, for now, okay?  Let's be sure people understand what you've already proposed.) 

Add in references to the "team of rivals" idea.  Let that idea work quietly on the 0% and 1% candidates and their supporters.

To the extent possible, be alert for opportunities to chat with those lagging candidates.  As a rule, any marginal candidate you can persuade to drop out and endorse you is a bonus.

Finally, study Kamala and Mayor Pete.  They are your real rivals, down the road.  If all goes well, and you pull ahead in the  delegate count, Kamala would be an excellent running mate for you.   So would Mayor Pete - but I rather like the idea of a two-woman ticket.  It's never been done, and women will be the key to this election. 

Why not?

The Debates: Mostly Good News.

I'm probably not alone in feeling that watching two two-hour, ten-candidate "debates" on consecutive nights was a bit much, but we all seem to have gotten through it. 

The DNC decided to stay with the dreadful mass-debate format, which means, really, that we don't get debates so much as something like an extremely nerdy class in high school where every student is trying to get the teacher's attention in order to score brownie points.

Since the ultimate winner of the Democratic debates, primaries, caucuses and conventions is going to have to take on the Current Occupant in one-on-one debates, wouldn't it have made more sense to start this process with something like a World Cup format?  By grouping the candidates in fours for round-robin, one-on-one debates - pre-recorded and released all at once - the DNC might have given us some idea how the contenders perform in the format that will actually matter in Fall, 2020.

But the DNC will do what it does.  As my old Dad would have said, "Those folks could f**k up a two-car funeral."  As long as the Republicans are the only alternative, we all have to live with that.

Aside from the format - and the masterful job done by NBC in trying to manage ten candidates with five moderators - the result of the two nights was surprisingly good.

First of all, people watched.  All sorts of numbers are flying around - and with so many means of live and delayed viewing available, it's hard to be sure - but clearly, many millions of Americans took time out on two midsummer nights to hear twenty candidates talking about an election which takes place in sixteen months.  That, in itself, argues a high level of interest and civic commitment.

And, despite the awkward format and the muddled moderation, what they got was two reasonably informative, largely civil, and surprisingly interesting evenings.

The civility owes much to the on-stage presence of two formidable women.  On Night One, Elizabeth Warren - the only top-tier candidate present - exercised a quiet command over the tendency of other candidates to engage in attention-seeking.  (Okay, with the occasional exception of de Blasio and Delaney, trying desperately from the opposite wings to generate some interest.)

On Night Two, Kamala Harris emerged as the Teacher, firmly calling the rest to order when things threatened to get out-of-hand.

It's easy to talk about leadership.  It's interesting when it shows up in the moment.  On their respective nights, Senators Warren and Harris showed the country something.

One great thing about the first-round debates was that they seem likely to have eliminated about two-thirds of the contenders.  I don't want to speak too soon.  This was one, two-part event, and we have a long way to go.  But I sense that the American people - those not still under the spell of the Orange One - want to narrow this field down quickly and unite behind a champion.

Pretty clearly, that has started to happen.  On Night Two, the campaign's two front-runners - both elderly white men - stumbled badly.  For Joe Biden, a combination of characteristic vagueness and a shrewd take-down by Senator Harris might well have marked the beginning of the end.

Biden has never been the right candidate for 2020.  Like George H. W. Bush in 1992, he seems to be running out of a sense of entitlement, but without any real passion or sense of mission.  His viability as a front-runner has been based on his high poll numbers among African-American voters - a crucial bloc within the Democratic coalition.  Kamala Harris just gave black voters a younger, more exciting, and much more relatable option.

Bernie Sanders did better than Old Joe, but it probably wasn't enough.  The thing we love about Bernie is that he never changes - which is a great thing in a tribune of the people, but not so great in a President.  No one since George Washington - for whom the job description in Article II was written - has entered the Presidency ready from Day One.  Presidents have to grow on-the-job.

Bernie, like King Lear's Kent, seems "too old to learn".  His faithful supporters will stick with him, but their numbers seem unlikely to grow much, either.  Bernie has done something wonderful for this country.  He has brought his ideas front-and-center and made it possible for serious progressives to aspire to a chance to govern.  But there are younger - or at least, younger-seeming - candidates ready to shape those ideas into laws, policies, and executive orders.  Bernie's time has probably come and gone.

At least half of the field will probably never have a time.  Most viewers came away wondering why some of them ever thought they might actually have a shot.  Indeed, some were so bad that they served as comic relief.  De Blasio, doing his best version of the loud New Yorker trying get his order taken at the deli without waiting for his number to be called.  Hickenlooper trying, without success, to string together a complete sentence.  Delaney channeling Les Nessman.  Marianne Moonbeam channeling Yoko Ono.

You have to wonder why some of these characters were in the debates, while two more legitimate contenders - named Seth and Bullock, for you Deadwood fans - were sidelined.

Whatever.  The sooner we all stop sending in dollars to the no-hopers - and unsubscribe from their email lists - the sooner they will get the message and drop out, leaving us with a smaller field.

And this is said with all due respect for those who - while they have no path to the White House in  2020 - might have better prospects in future.

There is other, useful work to be done in this cycle.  Removing the Current Occupant from the White House is vital - but equally so is removing Mitch McConnell, or at least reducing him to Minority Leader.

There are people in this race who should be running against incumbent Republican Senators - starting with Beto O'Rourke.  Others might, with a well-timed, full-throated endorsement of a more viable contender, earn themselves a seat in the next President's Cabinet.  Jay Inslee, for example, might do well at EPA - but not if he holds on too long.

Who knows, the next President might even create a new Cabinet office - to run, say, the Department of Oneness.  And offer it to... but let's be kind.

One final bit of good news:  For almost the past week, Americans - and millions around the world - have not been talking about the Current Occupant.  And that's vital.  His whole power comes from his ability to make himself the center of attention.  That's all he's got.

He's not that bright.  He's not that focused.  He knows almost nothing.  He has remarkably little energy or commitment to a job that demands an enormous amount of both.  All he has is the awareness that his name is constantly on everyone's lips.

When that stops happening, he starts to lose his power.  And probably, his mind.

The more we focus on the legitimate Democratic challengers, the better.

The Niagara Strategy

Today's topic is the one-way verticality of modern campaigning.  With the invention of the internet, we were supposed to be entering a new era of democracy - a flattening out of hierarchies in favor of more open and direct communication, where everyone could have a voice.

That didn't happen, of course - or at least, it didn't happen where it matters.  We ordinary mortals can communicate with each other about what we had for lunch, or how cute this kitty is.  But try getting in touch - personal touch - with a presidential candidate.  Unless you're willing to move to Iowa or New Hampshire, or applying for a job, good luck with that.  Campaigns no longer have mailing addresses or telephone numbers, and if you try to communicate by email or Twitter, you're basically just giving your fingers and thumbs a workout.

Which is surprising, really.  When I was a kid, my Dad was a politician - elected six times to the Virginia legislature - and rounding up volunteers was always a major part of the strategy.  As a candidate, you needed a fair number of volunteers to do the routine tasks that made up running for office.

Those were the days of electric typewriters, rolodexes, phone banks, and box after box of index cards, but campaigns found ways of staying in touch with people.  And not just from the top down.  Volunteers had access - on some level.  If you had an idea, a complaint, or an observation, there was someone willing to hear it - at least, until you proved yourself a crank or nutcase.

That's no longer how it works.  Campaign staffs are huge and professional.  That's one of the main reasons candidates need to raise so much money.  You need to pay people.  (If you're a Democrat, you need to provide health insurance and allow them to unionize - which is good, I suppose.)  All these professionals seem to be young.  They all have impressive resumes.  And they all talk to each other - but God help you if you're just a citizen with something to say.

Not, of course, that there's no communication.  Make a contribution or answer an inquiry from a campaign and - once they have your email address - you'll receive a torrent of information and requests for additional contributions.  They'll also invite your input - but only in terms of answers to questions posed by the campaign.  They know what they want to know - and that's all they want to know.

Which isn't surprising, really, given the mindset of the internet generation.  When you grow up doing research on the web - looking something up on Wikipedia, for example - it's not at all like it used to be.  In my youth, doing research - general research, scholarly research, legal research - involved going to a library and looking in books.

I realize that sounds old fashioned, but the great thing about that sort of research is that it sometimes led to happy accidents.  For example, if you aren't familiar with actual encyclopedias, one of the cool things is that - in addition to the exact entry you were looking for - there were other entries right before and after it.  Sometimes, you would end up reading several neighboring entries and learn something more interesting than what you wanted to know.  Sometimes, even more relevant.

As a college student, I got used the phenomenon of going into the "stacks" to find a book, and finding a much more useful book on the same shelf.  As a law student and young lawyer, I was astonished at how often legal research led me from the cases I thought I needed to cases that were far more persuasive - again, sometimes by chance or mere proximity.

But in a modern "data-driven" campaign, the professionals will only ask the questions they think matter - which means they will never encounter the question they never thought of.

And the sad thing is, when one of these people becomes President - we all must hope - they will continue to be surrounded by people who think they know all the questions, and therefore, all the possible answers.  Without the slightest chance of an actual new idea.

And that's what I call the "Niagara Strategy".  A modern campaign is set up to become a one-way flow of information and requests - from the top down.  If you're an ordinary citizen with an ordinary question - or even a brilliant insight - your chances of getting it heard are next to zero.

Candidates will tell you they're listening, but that's not really true.  Presidents have long lived inside a bubble.  Now, you only have to start running to enter that condition.

I don't know how you fix that.  I understand that Elizabeth Warren is calling small contributors - she has no other kind - at random.  That's something.  But odds most folks, getting an out-of-the-blue call from an amazing person like Senator Warren, will be too stunned and excited to remember what they would really want to say.

When he was President, and running a war to preserve the Union, Abraham Lincoln made it a point to open his doors regularly - for several hours - to receive anyone who was willing to stand in line outside the White House for a chance to talk with him.  Not just men, either.  He met a mother who had lost a husband and sons in the war, and wanted her last son home to do the plowing.  He met inventors with crazy, and not-so-crazy, ideas.  He met people who disagreed with him about the conduct of the war.

Lincoln's "public opinion baths" were a vital part of how he governed - and he was doing something a lot more important than anything going on at present.  (Except climate change, of course.  We'll see how many candidates really make that an issue.)  But the last President to do something like that was the fictional Jed Bartlet, with his chief of staff's "Big Block of Cheese Days".  I don't see much chance anyone out there today will renew the practice.

And I'm not unaware that most candidates are holding town meetings.  Good for them.  Town meetings are a great opportunity for people to get the feeling that candidates are hearing their unique concerns.  But that's not really how they work.

When I was working in John Warner's first campaign for Senate - as a volunteer - I saw him come before some civic association, take out his speech, toss it aside, pull of his suit coat, and ask for questions.  Broad-shouldered John would roll up his sleeves and say. "To heck with this speech. I want to wrestle with your questions."  And every question he got, he had an answer - complete with statistics and facts.  I was very impressed.

So I asked an aide how he dared to open himself up that way.  And the aide told me:  "There's no risk. We've done extensive polling.  There are seventeen questions a person might ask that anyone else in the room is likely to care about.  And John has memorized his answers to those seventeen questions.

"If anyone asks about something else, it's either going to be an obscure question or something nutty.  Either way, no one else in the room will care a hoot in hell about it.  So John will furrow his brow and say, 'I'm sorry.  I haven't done my research on that important question, but I promise - if you'll give your contact information to my aide over there - I'll get you a letter within the week.

"And we would send that letter.  Which satisfies the person asking, and pleases everyone else, who doesn't care about that unfamiliar topic and wants to get to their concerns, which will almost always be one of the seventeen questions John is prepared to answer."

Which is pretty much what will happen at a town meeting.  Indeed, with TV cameras on, most citizens will avoid asking a really unique question, for fear of making fools of themselves.  They'll ask something safe.  Which, of course, keeps the candidates safe, too.

Politics.  Love it or hate it - and any intelligent person must do both - a lot of it has always been a show.  But back before the internet - and the Niagara Strategy - there was a lot more opportunity for a volunteer or a concerned citizen to get a new idea, or a new question, in front of somebody in position to do something.

It seems that's no longer the world.

Starting With "OR"

As the Election of 2020 takes shape, serious problems confront those who wish not only to displace the incumbent President, but to elect a President and a Congress prepared to reverse the destructive policies of his administration, and launch this country on a course of serious and fundamental reform.

The difficulty, as always, is that the only means at hand for ending this presidency is the Democratic Party - a party which has been, for the past half century, a most slender reed upon which to lean.  I don't wish to stray from my topic to dilate upon the bottomless subject of the Democratic Party and its weaknesses.  Suffice to say that the Democratic Party managed, three years ago, to lose the White House to the present incumbent - a feat which most experts considered impossible.  Even today, it is hard to work out how they managed it.

But they did - and we are all suffering the consequences.

At present, the Democratic Party is - nor surprisingly - attempting to "win the last war", rather than prepare for the fight we are all in.  Having disgraced itself by bending over backward to assist Mrs. Clinton to win the nomination from Senator Sanders, the DNC is now doing everything possible to seem fair to over two dozen candidates - many of whom have about as much chance of being nominated as I do. 

In a few weeks, thanks to the DNC, we will all be invited to watch two consecutive nights of televised "debates", each featuring ten candidates. 

What citizens can expect to learn from these joint press conferences - debates they will not be - is difficult to say.  In 2016, when a crowded Republican field engaged in a similar exercise, the only winner was the loudest, crudest, most unrestrained individual on the debate stage.  The one, in short, willing to do anything for attention.

What the DNC should be doing is something that would help interested citizens narrow their choices much more quickly.  A long, drawn-out nominating process - with dozens of candidates - will only drain the eventual nominee's resources of energy, time, and treasure while the President waits, fresh and rested, on a mountain of corporate (and probably also foreign) gold.

But since the DNC is not about to do anything so constructive, it is up to the American people - or at least, the 60% not enthralled by the grotesque (thanks, Mayor Pete) theatrics of the incumbent - to move more quickly to narrow down the field to a few legitimate contenders.

One way of doing so would be to "anoint" one candidate as the presumptive nominee, but that would be unwise.  At present, most polls indicate that the leading candidate is former Vice President Joe Biden - a decent man and career public servant, but an elderly fellow who doesn't seem to have encountered a new idea since the invention of the audio cassette player.

Another strategy would be for those who have not yet chosen one candidate to band together to cooperate on behalf of several candidates - candidates who are doing well in the polls, but who have not yet shaken off the twenty or so also-rans who are, almost certainly, not going to be President this time around.

Strategic cooperation makes good sense for candidates who are consistently earning between 5% and 14% in the national polls.  Under Democratic Party rules, a candidate must gain at least 15% support in a given state's primary, caucus or convention in order to qualify for any delegates from that state. 

The rules are complicated, and the process for earning 15% varies from state to state - but the price of non-cooperation can be extremely high.  In simple terms, it works like this:  Suppose State A holds a primary, and one candidate gets 15% of the vote, while four others come in with 14% each.  Under the rules, the candidate getting 15% would probably end up with all of that state's delegates. 

And with two dozen or so candidates on some primary ballots, dividing the votes, such outcomes are entirely predictable.

Now, I confess, the above scenario is extremely simplistic.  Each state has its own procedure for determining the point at which the 15% rule comes into effect.  But clearly, candidates who are doing well - but not consistently hitting 15% in a crowded field - must consider cooperation.  Otherwise, there's a good chance old Joe Biden will end up the winner by default - prevailing mainly on the strength of name-recognition.

And we could do much better.

There is a second advantage to strategic cooperation for strong candidates who are not yet polling at 15%.  By helping each other to become "viable" - that is, able to qualify for delegates in multiple states - those cooperating could also encourage candidates polling at 3%, 2%, 1% or even less to consider other options.

And this could be vital.  No matter who is elected President in 2020, unless she or he also has a Democratic Senate, Mitch McConnell will be lying in wait, ready to kill every progressive bill - and block every strong judicial appointment - the new President proposes.

At present, there are at least a half-dozen remarkable political talents in the Presidential race, or considering getting in, who are not going to be President this time around, but who could succeed in winning Senate seats now held by Republicans. 

The sooner is reality comes home to some of these candidates, the sooner they can turn their thoughts to knocking off Republican Senators in their home states - and making the Senate their base for another presidential bid in, say, 2028.

At any rate, this is what I've been thinking.  What's needed is something practical, logical, and helpful  - a citizen movement to begin forging an alliance among candidates with a realistic chance of emerging as the eventual nominee.

It seems to me logical that there are three candidates who fit this definition:  Pete Buttigieg, Elizabeth Warren, and Kamala Harris.

Over recent months, these three candidates have shown consistent, gradually rising support in the polls.  They've done extremely well in town meetings.  They've raised a lot of money.  They've gotten past - one hopes - the early jitters and silly mistakes of a new campaign.

And no one else fits this group.  Bernie Sanders could, but it's my perception that his supporters are intense loyalists, angry about the injustices of 2016, and not presently prepared to cooperate strategically with other candidates.  I understand their feelings.  I was for Bernie in 2016, and I still have his old, fading bumper sticker on my car.  But that was then.  This, I believe, is the year for someone fresh.

Does any other candidate fit?  Not really.  Cory Booker just doesn't seem to be catching fire.  Beto O'Rourke looked really hot for a month, but is now tanking in most polls.  (And Beto is the perfect case of a candidate who should be setting his sights on the Senate.  He'd beat John Cornyn, and he has plenty of time to run for President.)

Really, the key three are Harris, Warren, and Buttigieg.  A lot of us are looking at these three - perhaps leaning to one, but happy at the idea of any of them as our next President.

With that in mind, I've created a new Facebook group called OR 2020 - OR being the conjunction, not an abbreviation for my home state.  It's an early effort to start collecting people willing to get involved in a cooperative campaign to make one of these exceptional individuals our next President - and to encourage a lot of other candidates who aren't doing so well to consider helping out by running for the Senate.

I invite you to join.  I trust this group will quickly evolve into something larger and more formal - and that I can turn it over to those more adept at the use of social media than I will ever be.

But one must start somewhere, and this is a start.

I invite you to join.

Impeachment: Start With the Minions

At a time when they should unite in opposition to the President and his policies, Congressional Democrats appear divided over the fraught question of whether now is the time to begin impeachment proceedings against him.

I am one who believes that the President has been impeachable from the earliest days of this Administration.  Almost from the time he assumed office, Mr. Trump has repeatedly violated his Constitutional oath "to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States".  Oath-breaking of that nature is surely all any Congress should need to proceed against a President.

That said, it seems clear that - despite twenty-seven months' proof of the President's manifest unfitness for office - Congress hesitates.  The Republican Party, united in defense of the indefensible, seems determined to obstruct any impeachment process.  Democrats, concerned about the 2020 elections, are divided on strategic grounds.

Herewith, a modest proposal:  Once they have finished reading the Mueller Report (as redacted), Democratic Senators and Congressmen/women should read up on history of England in the seventeenth century - with particular reference to the impeachment of Archbishop Laud and the bill of attainder against the first Earl of Strafford.

There is, as always, a great deal to be learned from the study of History.

In this case, a majority of the English House of Commons confronted, in King Charles I, an autocrat determined to govern without due respect for the legislative and fiscal powers of Parliament.  Yet, despite his high-handed manner, King Charles retained a great deal of popular support.  He was, after all, King, by the Grace of God.

Rather than throwing up their hands and letting King Charles continue in his high-handed career, the majority of the House of Commons went after his two chief advisors.  Archbishop Laud was impeached, imprisoned and, a few years later, beheaded.  Strafford was attainted, imprisoned in the Tower, and promptly beheaded.

Deprived of his chief advisors, King Charles was dramatically weakened.  A year later, pushed to the limit, he made the fatal mistake of raising an army and taking up arms against Parliament.  The English Civil War began, and Charles' ultimate defeat on the battlefield ended his reign, and his life.

In these less sanguinary times, it's hard to imagine that anyone would seriously advocate beheading members of the Trump Administration, much less the President - and a civil war would be almost inconceivable.  But the strategy pursued by Parliament when King Charles attempted to govern as an autocrat deserves consideration.

It's not really surprising the Congressional Democrats seem unable to unite behind a direct effort to impeach the President.  After all, he retains the support of a significant part of the population and the stubborn adherence of Republican legislators who - however much they loathe him in private - fear losing their seats should they incur the wrath of his followers.

But, while that wrath would undoubtedly reach fever pitch should Congress seek to impeach the President, it's far less certain that violent passions would be roused if the House began impeachment proceedings against, say, Attorney General Barr, or Stephen Miller, or Sarah Sanders.

Yet these three - and others - are certainly impeachable.

In his bizarre mismanagement of the release of the Mueller Report, Attorney General Barr has been guilty of working entirely on behalf of the President, rather than on behalf of the American people.

Stephen Miller, perhaps the most personally loathsome member of the Administration - his chief always excepted - has consistently advised his irreflective and constitutionally-illiterate boss to pursue illegal and unconstitutional measures.

Sarah Sanders has admitted, under oath, to lying to the American people in order to justify the actions of her boss.

Impeachment proceedings against any or all of these individuals would be fully justified.  There's even a chance the Senate might vote to convict one or more of them.  After all, most Republican legislators secretly despise the President and his team.  And it's unlikely the President's base would be howling for blood if Republican Senators voted to condemn the ghoulish Miller, or the embarrassingly inept Sanders.

Barr, to be sure, might be another story.  He would have his defenders.  But Barr, as an old Washington hand with a respectable record of public service, has already shown himself to be uncomfortable when pressed by Congress to explain his conduct.  It's a fair bet that, if actually impeached, he would fold up like a cheap tent and resign, hoping thereby to preserve some scrap of his reputation.

Moreover, impeachment proceedings against these could just be the beginning.  Treasury Secretary Mnuchin refuses to turn over the President's tax records to Congress - in direct violation of statute.  That's sufficient grounds for impeachment and removal.  Jared Kushner is up-to-the-neck in nearly everything the President does.  Would anybody really be sorry to see him go?

The beginning of impeachment proceedings against these and other aides and advisors would create opportunities for Congressional committees to compel testimony and the production of documents which might eventually used against the President himself.  Such proceedings might also persuade other members, or former members, of the Administration to come forward with stories yet untold.

Best of all, impeachment of Barr, Miller, Sanders, and others would unite virtually all Democrats, something the prospect of impeaching the President seems, at this moment, unlikely to achieve.

Congress should begin here and now.  Impeach the minions.  One by one, deprive the President of his enablers and defenders - all the while compiling additional evidence against Individual One, himself.

It's the right thing to do, or at least, a right thing to do, until Democrats can unite behind the larger task.

A World Class Idea

Starting in June, qualifying candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination will engage in a series of twelve "debates" - six in 2019, six more in the early months of 2020.  The rules for qualifying are fairly generous.  A dozen candidates had qualified by late March, so figure at least sixteen will make the cut before things get under way.

Since there will be so many candidates, the Democratic National Committee has decided to split the field for the first "debate" into two consecutive nights, using a random process to assure that one debate will not feature the leading candidates and the other relative unknowns.

All of this sounds relatively fair - as though the DNC were trying to make up for leaning so heavily in favor of their preferred candidate in 2016.  But making things fair doesn't mean making them sensible - and these so-called "debates", with each night featuring seven or more candidates in a desperate struggle to impress, make absolutely no sense.  They are, at best, joint press conferences.

At worst, as the Republican version proved in 2016, they tend to favor the loudest, most aggressive, least nuanced speakers, rather than those who make the best, most reasoned arguments. 

What mass debates absolutely cannot do is inform potential Democratic primary voters and caucus-goers how well their eventual choice might perform in October, 2020, in a one-on-one confrontation with the Republican nominee.  Which, one would think, would be a consideration.

Now, there is no particular reason to expect the DNC to develop a process that makes sense.  This is, after all, the same DNC that found a way to lose the White House to Donald Trump - a thing most knowledgeable folks considered an impossibility until it actually happened.  

But really, given that thirty months have elapsed since the disaster of 2016, you'd think the DNC might have come up with something better than these tedious, uninformative cattle-calls they insist on calling "debates".

Especially since, in 2018, basically the entire planet - including the US - experienced the phenomenon called The World Cup, which uses a rather brilliant method to narrow a large field of contenders into a smaller one, while giving each contender a chance to play itself into the second round.

Now, as there are about seven billion people better able to explain the World Cup than I am, I'm not going to do that here.  I'd probably get some details wrong, and wind up having to apologize endlessly to readers who actually give a damn about soccer (or football) - a game played during the time of year when real men (I don't presume to speak for real women) are watching baseball. 

But the basic idea of the World Cup's first round - translated into terms of the Democratic nomination contest - might go like this.  

By a random process, the DNC would divide the field of qualifying candidates into groups of four (or five).  During the summer of 2019, each group would get together for a designated period (perhaps a week) and - over the course of that period - each member of the group would debate each other member, one-on-one, for 90 minutes.  The rules would be derived from those used in recent presidential contests.

Once all of the groups had completed their round-robin debates, the DNC would make all of these  debates available online, so that those interested could watch them when and as (and as often as) they chose.  [Note to DNC:  The technology for this actually exists.  I'm pretty sure.]

By hosting a series of round-robin, one-on-one debates, the DNC would thus give each candidate a chance to show what she or he can do against a single opponent - responding to valid points, defending their positions, matching wits - rather than posturing, interrupting, grimacing and gesticulating in order to get attention.  

That, alone, should justify going to a round-robin format, but there are other good reasons for doing so.

For one thing, while placing seven or eight candidates on a stage necessarily gives some a distinct positional advantage, placing two candidates on a stage can be completely fair.

Moreover, because two reasonably intelligent candidates could, to a certain extent, exchange ideas without the interference of a moderator, the role of that moderator should be significantly reduced.

Most of all, by using this process, the candidate who eventually wins the Democratic nomination would have gotten a good deal of practice at the sort of high-stakes, face-to-face confrontation that he or she will have with Donald Trump in the fall of 2020.

Which makes perfect sense.  Why not use a debate format which assures that the eventual Democratic nominee gets the gig, at least in part, by performing in the same sort of debate she or he will have to face in the actual election campaign?

If you think about it, the present format - by which the party's nomination will be decided, in significant part, through a unique procedure unrelated to anything that will occur in the fall campaign, is simply bizarre.  It makes about as much sense as - I don't know...

as deciding who breaks a tie in a sporting event which features fast-moving team play, by having one player at a time try to kick a ball from a fixed position past a goalie who knows it's coming.

And who would ever come up with a rule like that?

A Conditional Invitation

After a long absence, I return to this space with a rather different sense of purpose, and an entirely new perspective. 

The novelty of the perspective owes much to a decision taken in May - some six weeks after my 67th birthday - to leave my native Virginia and relocate to the Pacific Northwest.  The decision came about almost without time for reflection. 

I had been, for six years, renting the downstairs of a somewhat shabby Victorian home near downtown Staunton, Virginia.  My landlady had decided to sell, and had she offered me the house for 10% off her intended asking price.  I considered the offer for about a week, ultimately deciding I didn't want to undertake a long renovation process - and that, at any rate, there was nothing in particular tying me to Staunton.  Great town, and some good friends, but I'd never really become a part of things there.

Besides, I had work to do - work I'd been too long postponing.  A novel.

We all have one.  And mine has been "in the works" since I was 29.

At any rate, I called my investment advisors and my CPA, and they were unanimous that I should invest in a house.  So, in a matter of a few weeks, I had flown to my favorite Oregon beach town, surveyed the houses available in my price range, and made a successful offer. 

Thus, the new perspective.  I'm sitting at the west-facing window of my living room, where I can lift my eyes to admire one of those enormous rocks which make the Oregon coast so attractive.  Today, it's lit up by the westering sun.  In a few weeks, we'll move into the six-month rainy season which keeps Oregon from becoming another Southern California.

As for the purpose, I've already hinted at that.  The novel.  Which, being a political novel - set in the present day - requires me to do a good deal of thinking about where we are, as a nation and as a planet.  And considering ways in which we might do things better.

For I mean to write an optimistic novel.  Realistic, but hopeful.

And I propose to use this blog as a means of gathering thoughtful friends - old friends and new - to kick around ideas I might end up using in the novel.  A sort of brains trust, as it were.

If that sort of thing interests you - or if you know someone who might be interested - I welcome participation. 

But please understand, I don't invite a rehashing of tired arguments from the perspective of one of the two major parties.   Nor do I welcome ideology in any form.

I realized today, while doing household chores, that I have never been comfortable with ideology.  Or rather - since I have long known that - I realized why I have never been comfortable with it.

The reason is simple:  All ideologies are, ultimately, wrong.  By their nature, they require the true believer to reject certain perspectives - and a good deal of information - which doesn't fit in with his or her chosen belief system.

You might say that all ideologies - and here, I include doctrinaire religious faiths - are incredibly arrogant.  A mere mortal decides to accept a certain set of beliefs as being incontestably true.  As if any of us had the wisdom to make such a determination.

And of course, most true believers insist that the truths they proclaim are not theirs - that they are following the teachings or revelations of some great teacher - or even of some god.  But the fact remains, the true believer has decided, for himself, that the great teacher or the divine being is, of all possible teachers or deities, the one worthy of being followed. 

And what, I ask, could be more arrogant than that?

So, in issuing my invitation, I do so with this caveat.  I am not interested in ideology or dogma of any kind.  I accept that their is much to learn from every field of human knowledge - and almost every faith - but I insist on retaining the right to test each proposed truth against my own experience and the experiences of all humankind, throughout history.  And against alternative perspectives.  And against Reason.

And that, for today, is about it.  I hope to find a few friends who will help me sort out the ideas I will need for my novel.  Those who can help will have my gratitude.

But I plan on keeping the royalties.  If there are any.