Conventional wisdom says that Trump’s base is primarily made up of pissed-off white people. We’re told that they’re pissed-off at their jobs disappearing, at their towns being hollowed out, at the drugs decimating their communities, at working three jobs to stay afloat, and at the nagging feeling that people are laughing at them. We’re told that Trump speaks for these people, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. They only think he does. Trump waves shiny objects in their faces. He makes glittering promises, and he offers up colorful scapegoats they can blame for their misery. But he’s never once offered them anything real. What Shawn Fain is offering is real: Twice the money they’re making now. Better benefits, better working conditions, better job protections, more paid time off, regular cost-of-living adjustments, and a piece of the company’s profits they can put away for retirement. As President of the United Automobile Workers (UAW), Fain kno
Just last week I was pointing out the growing rift in the GOP, a rift centered on the open obstruction of aid to Ukraine by what Liz Cheney has famously called the “Putin Wing” of the party. In the last week, the rift has only gotten wider. What I didn’t elaborate on then, though it’s closely related, was the apparent influence of both Russian money and Russian propaganda on a growing number of Republicans. This is now out in the open, and more prominent Republicans are going public about it. Several powerful GOP senators, including Thom Tillis and John Cornyn, are known to be not happy about their party’s ties to the Kremlin. But it’s two GOP House committee chairs who are making the biggest waves. Michael Turner, chair of the Intelligence Committee, and Michael McCaul, chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, both made the startling claim that some of their Republican colleagues were echoing Russian propaganda, right on the House floor. They stopped short of c