Double Standards = Only Standard Is What Helps Me

Republicans screamed for investigation after investigation on Hillary Clinton's email security - none of which showed more than procedural lapses - but now they aren't supportive of an investigation of Trump officials who had actual, unauthorized conversations with Russian intelligence agencies.  This would appear to be  a double standard.  Or, in fact the reason they gave - national security - was NOT the real standard.

I'd suggest that the standard or the 'principle' they used to call for the Clinton investigations had nothing to do with national security or whatever other reasons they offered to justify the time and money spent on the investigations.

Rather the standard or  'principle' was 'help us win, help them lose.'


The Republicans refused to hold confirmation hearings on Supreme Court nominee Garland on the grounds that a lame duck president shouldn't appoint the next SC judge.   They delayed hundreds of other Obama appointments.  Yet, today, they are blasting Democrats who want to hold thorough hearings and investigations of Trump's nominees.  From Politico:

"The GOP says the calls for delay are a transparent attempt by Democrats to slow down the confirmation process and isolate individual nominees with negative publicity. Don Stewart, a spokesman for McConnell, said 'Sen. Schumer is not satisfied with precedent and best practices.'"

They can really say this stuff with a straight face?  Well, those with the power to do what they want can, well, do what they want.

Double standard again, if the principle is to hold speedy nomination processes.  But it's clearly not.  The principle is 'help us win, help them lose.'


Trump and the Republicans have been supporting a ban on refugees and particularly those from half a dozen Muslim-majority countries on the grounds that there needs to be 'extreme vetting.'

Yet today, the Wall Street Journal reports

'The officials’ decision to keep information from Donald J. Trump underscores the deep mistrust that has developed between the intelligence community and the president over his team’s contacts with the Russian government, as well as the enmity he has shown toward U.S. spy agencies.'

Exactly what sort of vetting was there before Stephen Bannon assumed his seat on the National Security Council?  Any at all?  So, extreme vetting for some (when we already have a very thorough vetting procedure for immigrants and refugees), but not for Trump staff and nominees.   Double standard, if vetting were
really the issue.

For Trump, it's been clear for a long time, that 'help me win, help them lose' is is very top principle in life.  For many of the Republicans who would appear to be applying double standards and rejecting reality (i.e. climate change) 'help me win' essentially boils down to 'do what my big campaign funders want.'  Whether they be oil companies, pharmaceuticals, telecommunications, agribusiness, gun manufacturers, insurance companies, you get the picture.  (Democrats are not immune from helping their funders either, of course.)

For those of my readers who do talk to Trump supporters, I'm just offering some questions you can ask them here.

• If the Republicans are so interested in national security, why aren't they livid about the Trump team's contacts with Russian intelligence agencies?
• If the Republicans are so interested in extreme vetting, why don't they want Trump's appointees to be carefully vetted?
• If Republicans blocked countless Obama appointees, why are they complaining so vociferously about Democrats wanting to hold confirmation hearings that look carefully into the backgrounds of the appointees?  

How To Change All This

Actually, humans are humans, and it's likely that a certain percent of them will be lusting for power, so the only way to prevent abuse of power is to structure the system appropriately.

For the balance of power in Congress to change, people are going to have to work hard to overcome the gerrymandering of congressional districts.  They need to elect as many Democratic governors and  state legislatures as possible in 2018.  This is so they have more control of the 2020 redistricting processes in the states that impact the fairness of the congressional districts. An extreme example where, according to Price Economics and others,

"Democrats won more than half of the statewide vote, but only 5 out of 18 House seats."

In plain simple language, Democrats got 50% of the vote in Pennsylvania congressional districts, but only 28% of the members of Congress.

The Pennsylvania redistricting committee could do this by drawing district lines that put most the Democrats into a few districts so that the other districts go Republican.

Without changing these practices, the Democrats will not win back the house.  So start finding out about your own state redistricting process and how you can make it more fair.   The Republicans worked on this for years and years, so 2030 should be the real target (I know that's depressing) and we need to make as much change as possible for the 2020 census.

[Go back and look at the US Constitution.  Article 1, Section 2:

"Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons. The actual Enumeration shall be made within three Years after the first Meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent Term of ten Years, in such Manner as they shall by Law direct."

So every ten years the Census Bureau counts how many people there are so they can know how many representatives each state gets.  That count (or enumeration) is what the state redistricting boards use to make districts.]