“Pondering the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium 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.
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Josh Barrow: Michael Bloomberg just summed up the election in one sentence
“Together, let’s elect a sane, competent person.”
It’s not a soaring campaign slogan, but it’s the strongest argument for voting for Hillary Clinton — and it brought laughs and cheers when Michael Bloomberg said it at the Democratic National Convention on Wednesday night. [..]
But what’s our alternative? Are we going to hand the nuclear codes to an ignorant, hot-headed egomaniac with a relentless urge to pursue vendettas and an insatiable thirst for Vladimir Putin?
The options on the table are that and Hillary Clinton, who at least is sane and competent and who does not pose a significant risk of the end of the American republic.
It’s a depressing choice to make but not a difficult one — which is why Bloomberg could sum it up so succinctly.
David Leonhardt: The Clear and Present Danger of Donald Trump
Time and again as president, Barack Obama has chosen to use cautious language, at times frustrating both his allies and critics. His descriptions of corporate America’s misbehavior during the financial crisis sounded like cocktail-party chatter compared with Franklin D. Roosevelt’s jeremiads. Obama’s sporadic refusal to utter “terrorism” or “radical Islam” has become a Republican meme.
All of which highlights the bluntness and harshness of his attacks on Donald Trump on Wednesday night.
“Anyone who threatens our values, whether fascists or communists or jihadists or,” Obama said, pausing slightly, “homegrown demagogues, will always fail in the end.” Look at that list: A president notorious for his cool demeanor compared the opposing party’s presidential nominee to America’s two great 20th-century enemies and its bloodthirsty 21st-century enemy.
Mr. Obama has now been on the national scene for 12 years and a day, dating to his 2004 speech at this same convention. Can you think of any personal insult that he has levied in that time that remotely approaches this one? I cannot. And I don’t think Obama did it casually.
Heather Digby Parton: The DNC message to fed-up Republicans: Leave the dark side and join us
Last night we saw Barack Obama give his last DNC speech as president and it was one of his best speeches ever, which is saying something. It’s very unusual for a president to pass the baton with such enthusiasm to his successor. In the past the president either had no respect for the person running to replace him or the new candidate felt he needed to run against the president’s record. There was nothing like the full-throated endorsement from Barack Obama last night with Eisenhower-Nixon, Johnson-Humphrey, Reagan-Bush, Clinton-Gore or Bush-McCain. There is no doubt that President Obama is happily entrusting Clinton to carry on his legacy and Clinton is warmly embracing it. For better or worse, these two believe their legacies are entwined.
It was a good night for the Democrats in general. While there were many thematic moments, including some moving testimonials about gun violence and a film about climate change by James Cameron. But coming as it did after Donald Trump held a press conference and invited the Russian government to do some more hacking on his behalf (among other inhinged ramblings), it was an excellent opportunity for the party to show America that voting for a madman is unnecessary, even if you generally vote Republican. And as it turned out that was exactly what they had planned.
Bill Moyers and Michael Winship: Progressives were victorious: At the Democratic National Convention, progressive values are a focus (so far)
Shoot if you must these old grey heads, but these two semi-qualified observers of the passing political scene watched Monday night’s proceedings at the Democratic National Convention and saw past the heckles and opprobrium of the leather-lunged few. Instead, we witnessed an evening of progressive rhetoric and thoughtfulness unseen on a big political stage since the days of William Jennings Bryan, Wisconsin’s Fighting Bob La Follette, the Happy Warrior Al Smith and the crusaders of FDR’s New Deal. Not to mention Hubert Humphrey, Jesse Jackson, Shirley Chisholm, and a host of others who though history kept beating the drums for ordinary people against the organized might of Big Money. [..]
In her acceptance speech Thursday night, Hillary Clinton doubtless will say similar things and praise the progressive gospel of campaign finance reform, professing to shun the appeasement of Wall Street — the big banks, hedge fund managers and private equity oligarchs.
All well and good, but if her actions and her party’s continue to prove otherwise, the rousing rhetoric of this week — and the historic nomination of the first woman as a presidential nominee — may fade to insignificance as an angry, disillusioned and despairing public opens the door wide for the phony “I’m so rich I can’t be bought off” gospel of Donald J. Trump. Caveat emptor.
Mark Bittman: Hillary Clinton is the status quo candidate, and Trump is capitalizing on it
I pose to you these questions: if you’re unhappy and you’re offered two options, one of which is to guarantee that you continue in your unhappiness, and the other of which is to offer you uncertainty but some vague possibility of increased happiness … what do you do? You’re in a dungeon, in shackles, and an obvious fraud – a charlatan– comes and says, “I can show you a better life, believe me,” what do you do?
Don’t answer too quickly, but think back a couple of weeks: it seemed that no one in their right mind thought Brexit would pass, but it did. And it did because anyone with a gripe, from both the so-called right and the so-called left, voted Leave. If you are disgruntled, for whatever reason – because you hate migrants, because you have no job or you have to wait for a text offering you day work, because you want a better life, because National Health doesn’t work for you and those promoting “Leave” promised more money for it, because you’re sick of Europe being run by bankers – you voted Leave.
It was a referendum, and voting “Leave” was a protest; voting “Remain” was a lukewarm endorsement of the status quo.
What if, in America, the 2016 presidential election is a referendum on the status quo? I mean, do you know anyone who wants things to stay the way they are? Everyone wants either progress or a return to the fictional “way things used to be”.
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