Barack Obama

Iowa Caucus History, And Caucuses Elsewhere In 2024

In the past, there were up to 15 states that held Presidential Caucuses, with them first evolving in the 1970s.

Today, in 2024, there are only a few states that hold caucuses, with the overwhelming majority having Presidential primaries.

The only states in 2024 with caucuses being held by both major political parties are:

Hawaii
Idaho
Iowa
North Dakota
Wyoming

Two other states have Republicans having caucuses, while Democrats have primaries

Those two states with this odd situation are

Missouri
Nevada

Notice none of these total seven states have large populations, with Missouri being the largest.

At the same time, the Iowa Caucuses have NOT been a good example of accuracy as to who would be the nominees or winners of the Presidency.

The only Presidents who won in Iowa and went on to the White House were:

Jimmy Carter 1976
George W. Bush 2000
Barack Obama 2008

Walter Mondale in 1984, Al Gore in 2000, John Kerry in 2004, and Hillary Clinton in 2016 won the Iowa Caucuses but lost the Presidency for Democrats, while for the Republicans, only Bob Dole in 1996 won in Iowa and then lost the Presidency.

The Disgraceful Fawning Of Republican Women Who Want To Be Donald Trump’s Vice Presidential Running Mate!

It is an unbelievable disgrace how several Republican women politicians are fawning to Donald Trump, in hopes that one of them will end up as his Vice Presidential running mate.

These include the following:

South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem

New York Congresswoman Elise Stefanik

Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders

Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene

Former South Carolina Governor and Republican Presidential contender Nikki Haley

This last possibility is highly unlikely, as now Trump is accusing Haley of being ineligible, not being born in America, which is a falsehood.

This was the same “Birther” tactic Trump used against Barack Obama, Ted Cruz, and Kamala Harris.

Haley is also the only one of these women who we could trust being a heartbeat away from the Presidency, as the others are “light weights”, not having the credentials to serve in the Oval Office, and nowhere near the qualifications of Vice President Kamala Harris!

Republican Speakers Of The House: From Bad To Disastrous!

The Republican Party has gone from bad to disastrous in their choosing of Speakers of the House in the past thirty years.

Dennis Hastert, the longest serving Republican Speaker in American history, eight years, from 1999-2007, seemed reasonable, but later was tried and convicted as a sex offender of teenage boys, and served time in prison, becoming the highest ranked elected official in American history to serve a prison sentence.

From 2011-2015, John Boehner served as Speaker, and got mixed reviews, as a major decline in reputation as compared to Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who served from 2007-2011, and later from 2019-2023. Boehner made it his mission to do everything possible to block President Barack Obama in any way imaginable.

Paul Ryan succeeded Boehner from late 2015-2019, and is considered to have been worse than Boehner.

Then, Kevin McCarthy became Speaker in 2023 after 15 ballots, and ended up serving only nine plus months, as he was voted out by his Republican caucus, and is considered to have been worse than any of his Republican predecessors.

And now, we have Mike Johnson, who is a religious extremist, rejects science and facts, and has proved to be a Donald Trump lackey, after having refused to certify Joe Biden’s victory in the Presidential Election of 2020.

The idea that these men were and are two heartbeats away from the Presidency is terrifying, and they make Nancy Pelosi stand out as one of the top few Speakers of the House in all of American history!

118th Congress Least Productive Since Great Depression 72nd Congress!

The 118th Congress (2023-2025) is fast becoming the least productive since the 72nd Congress (1931-1933) under President Herbert Hoover at the worst times of the Great Depression.

Both the House of Representatives and US Senate are responsible for such poor performance, but clearly, if the House of Representatives is poorly organized and operated, the Senate cannot make up for it.

Both Congresses had one house Democratic, and one Republican, which also caused stalemate and gridlock.

The fact that the House of Representatives Republican majority has just voted an Impeachment inquiry against President Joe Biden, with zero evidence of such abuse of power, is a sign of how incompetent and hopeless the 118th Congress is, even with a small Democratic majority in the US Senate.

Clearly, the most productive Congresses have been when one party, in all modern times Democrats, has had a vast advantage in the number of seats in both houses of Congress.

So those most productive Congresses were, chronologically:

63rd Congress (1913-1915) under Woodrow Wilson
73rd Congress (1933-1935) under Franklin D. Roosevelt
74th Congress (1935-1937) under Franklin D. Roosevelt
89th Congress (1965-1967) under Lyndon B. Johnson
111th Congress (2009-2011) under Barack Obama

The most productive of all were the 73rd Congress under FDR, and the 89th Congress under LBJ.

Nikki Haley Backed By Koch Right Wing “Americans For Prosperity”–Makes Her Unacceptable!

“Americans For Prosperity”, the Charles Koch family libertarian right wing powerful network, has endorsed and is financially supporting Nikki Haley as the best alternative to Donald Trump for the Republican Presidential nomination in 2024, choosing her over Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.

Haley has sold her soul to an evil group, which had done so much damage for many years, most notably backing the Tea Party Movement that emerged under Barack Obama in 2010.

This evil group has opposed any action on global warming; the Affordable Care Act; labor union rights; assisted in the Republican gaining of the House of Representatives in 2010 and the Senate in 2014; is against raising of the minimum wage and supportive of “right to work” laws which undermine worker rights; against Medicaid expansion; opposes internet neutrality; and promotes loads of “dark money” which allows them to have a deleterious effect on all kinds of other social issues, including attacks on Social Security and Medicare.

Basically, it is the Barry Goldwater 1964 right wing assault on the New Deal and later on the Great Society. The fact that Nikki Haley accepts their support, while certainly is common sense for her, it shows that she has no basic principles, is inconsistent in her outlook, and runs the risk of “being owned” by this extremist right wing group, in an attempt to overcome the advantage of Donald Trump as the Presidential campaign moves forward!

Joe Biden, The Diplomat In Action

President Joe Biden demonstrated his diplomatic skills these past few days, having what is described as productive meetings with the leaders of China and Mexico at the Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation Conference in California.

Twenty one nations are part of APEC, including, among others, Canada, Australia, Japan, South Korea, and Indonesia.

Biden has had long experiences in diplomacy as Vice President under Barack Obama, and earlier was engaged in foreign relations in his 36 years in the US Senate, including time as Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman.

Along with George H. W. Bush and Richard Nixon, Biden stands out on a short list of Presidents since World War II with foreign policy expertise before becoming President, and that is a major asset for American national security!

Deterioration Of Donald Trump An Alarm Bell That He MUST Be Stopped!

Any sane person, and unfortunately, there seem to be millions of Americans who are not so, would recognize the mental deterioration of Donald Trump, and his threats to impose totalitarian authoritarianism if he is returned to the White House!

Trump thinks Barack Obama is still President, and has the delusion that he can be installed in the White House despite his loss to Joe Biden!

The evil people around him would be very dangerous, as they would do his bidding, and do not care about American democracy and the rule of law!

Whatever means are necessary to stop this lunatic are essential, as Donald Trump has shown us that he is dangerous to all of us in America and in foreign affairs as well!

There is an alarm bell ringing, and every step MUST be taken in every way possible, to prevent Trump from ever having the chance to destroy our nation’s traditions and heritage!

One Year To Presidential Election Of 2024, And Joe Biden Looks In Bad Shape!

With one year to the Presidential Election Of 2024, President Joe Biden looks in bad shape, based on a New York Times-Siena College poll.

According to the poll, Donald Trump is ahead of Joe Biden in five of six swing state—4 points in Pennsylvania; 5 points in Michigan and Arizona; 6 points in Georgia; 10 points in Nevada; and with Biden ahead of Trump in Wisconsin by 2 points.

These statistics are stunning and worrisome, but one must realize that the history of polling shows one year out is no judgment of what will occur on Election Day.

One year ahead, there were no predictions that Harry Truman would win a full term in 1948; or that John F. Kennedy would win in 1960; or Richard Nixon would win in 1968; or Jimmy Carter (an unknown) would win in 1976; or Ronald Reagan would win in 1980; or Bill Clinton would win in 1992; or George W. Bush would win in 2000; or that Barack Obama would win in 2008; or that Donald Trump would win in 2016.

Also, one must realize that never has a President lost reelection to an opponent he had first defeated since Benjamin Harrison lost reelection to Grover Cleveland in 1892.

And with Donald Trump likely to be convicted on some of the 91 charges over four indictments in the next year, to believe that he will be able to defeat the man who defeated him, for the first time in 132 years, is to be living in an era of delusion.

Assuming that the economy will continue to do better, and with international crises a major factor, the President in office is, historically, highly likely to win reelection, particularly against someone who represents chaos, corruption, and incompetence, and as a threat to the American democratic system and to international stability!

But it is also clear that the message and the efforts to reelect Joe Biden and Kamala Harris and insure a Democratic controlled House of Representatives and Senate must move full scale ahead, as there is no time for any sense of relaxation about the future of the nation and the world at large!

Polls One Year Ahead Of National Elections Prove Nothing!

National polling a year or more ahead of a national election is pointless, as much too often, it proves to be totally out of line with reality.

Also, elections are not decided nationally, but state by state, so therefore, the hysteria over the close polls on the Presidency showing a tight race should not cause people to panic.

At this point in many past election cycles, we were told Barack Obama was in bad shape in 2011; that Hillary Clinton was the guaranteed nominee in 2007; that Rudy Giuliani was the favored Republican candidate in 2007; that Howard Dean was favored in 2003; and on and on and on!

A year and more is an eternity, and the Democrats and Joe Biden still would be the favorite moving forward!

The Mental Deterioration Of Donald Trump

Anyone who is normal can clearly see that Donald Trump is deteriorating mentally before America, everytime he writes on Truth Social, or gives a speech or an interview.

He is clearly delusional and paranoid, and continues to lie at a rate unmatched in American history by any American political leader.

He talks about Barack Obama as if he ran against him in 2016, and he says Joe Biden is about to take America into World War TWO, which occurred EIGHTY years ago, while he probably meant World War III!

Trump remains so self assured that he does not listen to or follow advice or counsel from his attorneys, and this will harm him in the upcoming trials he faces.

The thought that such a menace to civil order and common decency might be given the power to run again, and promise revenge on his “enemies” is horrifying, and further destroys the image of the Republican Party, which is clearly on its last legs, based on the craziness and lunacy not only of Donald Trump, but a large portion of the party leadership!