Earlier today, I read a profoundly unsettling reminder of past Republican presidential candidates' wartime demagoguery and voter suppression to win their elections. I realize from watching your strategy sessions with Rick, Stuart, and Joe that a critical focus for TLP will be to move the number of votes in swing states to the Bannon line. Brilliant! I’m all for it!
Do you think that crafting your messages to your target voters with this information (below) would piss them off to vote Dem or to stay home?
If not, TLP, what voter engagement organization would use this Intel? Should you think it is a potent message for 30 or 60-second spots?
The presidential elections highlighted by Thom were in 1968, 1991, and 2000.
I excerpted these historical facts from Thom Hartmann’s Substack:
“In 1968, for example, after tens of thousands of American deaths and millions of Vietnamese, President Lyndon Johnson had worked out a peace deal between the US, North Vietnam, and South Vietnam. His vice president, Hubert Humphrey, was running for president in the 1968 election against Richard Nixon, and announcing the peace deal in the fall of ’68 would almost certainly swing the election in Humphrey’s favor.
So Nixon went to work. He had his people reach out to the South Vietnamese officials and tell them that he’d make them rich if they’d just refuse to go along with LBJ’s peace deal. It worked.
The FBI had been wiretapping the Vietnamese and told LBJ about Nixon’s effort to prolong the Vietnam War. Thus, just three days before the 1968 election, Johnson phoned the Republican Senate leader, Everett Dirksen (you can listen to the entire conversation here):
President Johnson: Some of our folks, including some of the old China lobby, are going to the Vietnamese embassy and saying please notify the [South Vietnamese] president that if he’ll hold out ’til November 2nd, they could get a better deal. Now, I’m reading their hand. I don’t want to get this in the campaign. And they oughtn’t to be doin’ this, Everett. This is treason.
Sen. Dirksen: I know.
Those tapes were only released by the LBJ library in the past decade, and that’s Richard Nixon, who Lyndon Johnson was accusing of treason.”
“But South Vietnam had taken Nixon’s deal and boycotted the peace talks, the war continued, and Nixon won the White House thanks to it.
An additional twenty-two thousand American soldiers and an additional million-plus Vietnamese died because of Nixon’s 1968 treason, and he left it to Jerry Ford to end the war and evacuate the American soldiers.
• Next, Thom cites Reagan’s duplicitousness; the costs of empowering Iran at the critical juncture Reagan chose has cost an incalculable number of lives in the decades since.
“Because Nixon got away with it, Reagan tried the same stunt, this time with Iran’s mullahs. His campaign — confirmed just this year by The New York Times — reached out to the Ayatollah and told him that if he’d hold the US hostages taken in the last year of Jimmy Carter’s presidency, he’d begin shipping weapons and spare parts to Iran as soon as he became president.
American soldiers died trying to rescue the hostages, but Iran firmly held them to meet the terms of Reagan’s deal; it was during Reagan’s swearing-in ceremony on January 20, 1981, that Iran released them, just as Reagan put his hand on the bible, to the minute.”
Reread this extraordinary moment:
Iran released them, just as Reagan put his hand on the Bible to the minute.
Next, Thom tells the story of Florida’s Secretary of State Katherine Harris’ unscrupulous actions to throw the presidency to Bush by throwing out ballots intentionally marked for Al Gore.
“Spoiled ballots” were ballots mostly coming from Black neighborhoods where Bush’s and Harris’ people had installed old, defective, and unreliable punch-card voting card machines. When people weren’t sure all the right holes had been punched (because some hadn’t worked right), they’d often write in “Al Gore” in the “write in” space along with punching the Gore button.
This, according to Bush and Harris, “spoiled” the ballots so they didn’t need to be counted, although there is no state or federal law that would back up that claim and require those ballots to be ignored.
As The New York Times reported a year after the 2000 election when the consortium of newspapers they were part of finally recounted all the ballots:
“While 35,176 voters wrote in Bush’s name after punching the hole for him, 80,775 wrote in Gore’s name while punching the hole for Gore. [Florida Secretary of State] Katherine Harris decided that these were ‘spoiled’ ballots because they were both punched and written upon and ordered that none of them should be counted.
“Many were from African American districts, where older and often broken machines were distributed, causing voters to write onto their ballots so their intent would be unambiguous.”
To read the full text of Thom Hartmann’s substack, I used excerpts from today’s newsletter, “Can the GOP Be Stopped from Defying Courts & Stealing Elections Out in the Open?”
You are an inspiration! I’ve been reading about what has been happening in Argentina since they elected a Trump like president and it is horrible chaos! It should be a huge warning for us.
TLP has kept me from falling completely into a depressive funk. Every time DFG gets another boost in the polls from his MAGAt crowd I get depressed. Then I read something by you, Rick, Joe, Tara, or Tigve (sp) I can lift my head and sometimes even laugh at the absurdities of Trump.
I have participated in supporting your various endeavors because I'm a 76 yo grandmother and I want my grandson to have a democratic future. I want him to understand concepts like sharing a common goal of building a better society, acceptance of differences between people, a climate where he can breathe and not fear the next weather event. To paraphrase Stephanie Rule, I want my kids to have a better America than I had. A more democratic country where he is free to read anything he wants to read, love anyone he wants to love, say anything he wants to say, believe in any faith he wants to believe (I'd prefer he didn't believe in a sky being, but that's his choice, so far) and not fear going to school because someone with a gun has a grudge.
I appreciate all of the effort you and the team have made in causing Trump fear and anger with your ads. I enjoy watching them, not only because they're true, and smart, but because they get under Trump's skin and make him angry. Keep up the good fight, I'm right there with you.
Thank you Reed. This is the most important battle of my lifetime (I'm 75 years old). I spent more than 20 years volunteering for the Republican party's candidates. I believed in every one of them. I believed in the Republican party. That is until Trump came along. He has destroyed everything I believed in. I no longer recognize the former Republican party. I no longer recognize SCOTUS since it is now the SCOT (Supreme Court of Trump) court. Our country is in peril and this fight to save it is worth it. We need all hands on deck to fight for the soul of our country. Thank you for being in the fight with us and encouraging us to participate in it too.
Reed, what an impassioned insightful article. The Sam Rayburn's quote said it all: "Any Jackass can kick down a barn. (So true!!!) It takes a carpenter to build one." (Absolutely!) Yes, there are very bad people plotting at this very moment. Over the last couple of days this phrase from Shakespeare's "MacBeth" has been running through my mind: " ...something evil this way comes." You did not overstate the battle. It is about EVERYTHING. I need to hone my skills; fill my toolbox; and go to work. I want to be a part of the bright light of a new dawn, also.
One conclusion I’ve reached the last few years is that the great thing about democracy, the thing that makes is the ‘worst system of Govt except for all the others’ isn’t that it is a system that delivers the best leaders, there’s probably systems out there better at delivering the best available leader at any particular time, but what sets Democracy apart is that it lets you get rid of the duds without bloodshed or chaos, no other system gives people the power to free themselves of terrible leaders as easily as democracy does
And this then is what makes Trump and his enablers so shameful, they want to remove the peoples right to free themselves from failed leaders, it’s bad enough the electoral college doesn’t even guarantee a 7 million majority are able to get rid of bad leaders, they still try and cheat and whine and cry to stop the overwhelming majority of us from getting rid of them
Reed, I believe our troops are growing. In any event, I have prayed for God to to help spread the word. Your work continues to be very valuable. Thank you.
My Mom told me she voted for Gary Johnson in 2016 so I wouldn't "hate her" but then went on to spout faux TV talking points every time I called, so much so I probably hadn't spoken to her in months when she passed away. 💔
Yep, Dad’s 85. He voted for Perot once upon a time. Otherwise, he ends any discussion by dismissively saying “you’re a democrat”. he sounds like he says demon. So I haven’t seen him but once this year. I’ll see him for his birthday month next month.
I wish you would take your podcast live like a town hall and travel to different cities to try and reach those who don’t podcast. You are doing such a great service, I wish more people were listening. I share with friends but cannot guarantee they listen. Great article- sorry I got a bit sidetracked. Sharon in Houston
Thank you Reed. This is another piece of necessary and great writing.
Dear Reed,
Earlier today, I read a profoundly unsettling reminder of past Republican presidential candidates' wartime demagoguery and voter suppression to win their elections. I realize from watching your strategy sessions with Rick, Stuart, and Joe that a critical focus for TLP will be to move the number of votes in swing states to the Bannon line. Brilliant! I’m all for it!
Do you think that crafting your messages to your target voters with this information (below) would piss them off to vote Dem or to stay home?
If not, TLP, what voter engagement organization would use this Intel? Should you think it is a potent message for 30 or 60-second spots?
The presidential elections highlighted by Thom were in 1968, 1991, and 2000.
I excerpted these historical facts from Thom Hartmann’s Substack:
“In 1968, for example, after tens of thousands of American deaths and millions of Vietnamese, President Lyndon Johnson had worked out a peace deal between the US, North Vietnam, and South Vietnam. His vice president, Hubert Humphrey, was running for president in the 1968 election against Richard Nixon, and announcing the peace deal in the fall of ’68 would almost certainly swing the election in Humphrey’s favor.
So Nixon went to work. He had his people reach out to the South Vietnamese officials and tell them that he’d make them rich if they’d just refuse to go along with LBJ’s peace deal. It worked.
The FBI had been wiretapping the Vietnamese and told LBJ about Nixon’s effort to prolong the Vietnam War. Thus, just three days before the 1968 election, Johnson phoned the Republican Senate leader, Everett Dirksen (you can listen to the entire conversation here):
President Johnson: Some of our folks, including some of the old China lobby, are going to the Vietnamese embassy and saying please notify the [South Vietnamese] president that if he’ll hold out ’til November 2nd, they could get a better deal. Now, I’m reading their hand. I don’t want to get this in the campaign. And they oughtn’t to be doin’ this, Everett. This is treason.
Sen. Dirksen: I know.
Those tapes were only released by the LBJ library in the past decade, and that’s Richard Nixon, who Lyndon Johnson was accusing of treason.”
“But South Vietnam had taken Nixon’s deal and boycotted the peace talks, the war continued, and Nixon won the White House thanks to it.
An additional twenty-two thousand American soldiers and an additional million-plus Vietnamese died because of Nixon’s 1968 treason, and he left it to Jerry Ford to end the war and evacuate the American soldiers.
• Next, Thom cites Reagan’s duplicitousness; the costs of empowering Iran at the critical juncture Reagan chose has cost an incalculable number of lives in the decades since.
“Because Nixon got away with it, Reagan tried the same stunt, this time with Iran’s mullahs. His campaign — confirmed just this year by The New York Times — reached out to the Ayatollah and told him that if he’d hold the US hostages taken in the last year of Jimmy Carter’s presidency, he’d begin shipping weapons and spare parts to Iran as soon as he became president.
American soldiers died trying to rescue the hostages, but Iran firmly held them to meet the terms of Reagan’s deal; it was during Reagan’s swearing-in ceremony on January 20, 1981, that Iran released them, just as Reagan put his hand on the bible, to the minute.”
Reread this extraordinary moment:
Iran released them, just as Reagan put his hand on the Bible to the minute.
Next, Thom tells the story of Florida’s Secretary of State Katherine Harris’ unscrupulous actions to throw the presidency to Bush by throwing out ballots intentionally marked for Al Gore.
“Spoiled ballots” were ballots mostly coming from Black neighborhoods where Bush’s and Harris’ people had installed old, defective, and unreliable punch-card voting card machines. When people weren’t sure all the right holes had been punched (because some hadn’t worked right), they’d often write in “Al Gore” in the “write in” space along with punching the Gore button.
This, according to Bush and Harris, “spoiled” the ballots so they didn’t need to be counted, although there is no state or federal law that would back up that claim and require those ballots to be ignored.
As The New York Times reported a year after the 2000 election when the consortium of newspapers they were part of finally recounted all the ballots:
“While 35,176 voters wrote in Bush’s name after punching the hole for him, 80,775 wrote in Gore’s name while punching the hole for Gore. [Florida Secretary of State] Katherine Harris decided that these were ‘spoiled’ ballots because they were both punched and written upon and ordered that none of them should be counted.
“Many were from African American districts, where older and often broken machines were distributed, causing voters to write onto their ballots so their intent would be unambiguous.”
To read the full text of Thom Hartmann’s substack, I used excerpts from today’s newsletter, “Can the GOP Be Stopped from Defying Courts & Stealing Elections Out in the Open?”
Reed, thank you for your thoughts.
Sincerely yours,
Bess Carrick
You are an inspiration! I’ve been reading about what has been happening in Argentina since they elected a Trump like president and it is horrible chaos! It should be a huge warning for us.
Go back to Xtwitter and spew your hatred there.
Civility is lost in this one.
TLP has kept me from falling completely into a depressive funk. Every time DFG gets another boost in the polls from his MAGAt crowd I get depressed. Then I read something by you, Rick, Joe, Tara, or Tigve (sp) I can lift my head and sometimes even laugh at the absurdities of Trump.
I have participated in supporting your various endeavors because I'm a 76 yo grandmother and I want my grandson to have a democratic future. I want him to understand concepts like sharing a common goal of building a better society, acceptance of differences between people, a climate where he can breathe and not fear the next weather event. To paraphrase Stephanie Rule, I want my kids to have a better America than I had. A more democratic country where he is free to read anything he wants to read, love anyone he wants to love, say anything he wants to say, believe in any faith he wants to believe (I'd prefer he didn't believe in a sky being, but that's his choice, so far) and not fear going to school because someone with a gun has a grudge.
I appreciate all of the effort you and the team have made in causing Trump fear and anger with your ads. I enjoy watching them, not only because they're true, and smart, but because they get under Trump's skin and make him angry. Keep up the good fight, I'm right there with you.
Thank you Reed. This is the most important battle of my lifetime (I'm 75 years old). I spent more than 20 years volunteering for the Republican party's candidates. I believed in every one of them. I believed in the Republican party. That is until Trump came along. He has destroyed everything I believed in. I no longer recognize the former Republican party. I no longer recognize SCOTUS since it is now the SCOT (Supreme Court of Trump) court. Our country is in peril and this fight to save it is worth it. We need all hands on deck to fight for the soul of our country. Thank you for being in the fight with us and encouraging us to participate in it too.
Reed, what an impassioned insightful article. The Sam Rayburn's quote said it all: "Any Jackass can kick down a barn. (So true!!!) It takes a carpenter to build one." (Absolutely!) Yes, there are very bad people plotting at this very moment. Over the last couple of days this phrase from Shakespeare's "MacBeth" has been running through my mind: " ...something evil this way comes." You did not overstate the battle. It is about EVERYTHING. I need to hone my skills; fill my toolbox; and go to work. I want to be a part of the bright light of a new dawn, also.
One conclusion I’ve reached the last few years is that the great thing about democracy, the thing that makes is the ‘worst system of Govt except for all the others’ isn’t that it is a system that delivers the best leaders, there’s probably systems out there better at delivering the best available leader at any particular time, but what sets Democracy apart is that it lets you get rid of the duds without bloodshed or chaos, no other system gives people the power to free themselves of terrible leaders as easily as democracy does
And this then is what makes Trump and his enablers so shameful, they want to remove the peoples right to free themselves from failed leaders, it’s bad enough the electoral college doesn’t even guarantee a 7 million majority are able to get rid of bad leaders, they still try and cheat and whine and cry to stop the overwhelming majority of us from getting rid of them
Reed, I believe our troops are growing. In any event, I have prayed for God to to help spread the word. Your work continues to be very valuable. Thank you.
My Mom told me she voted for Gary Johnson in 2016 so I wouldn't "hate her" but then went on to spout faux TV talking points every time I called, so much so I probably hadn't spoken to her in months when she passed away. 💔
Yep, Dad’s 85. He voted for Perot once upon a time. Otherwise, he ends any discussion by dismissively saying “you’re a democrat”. he sounds like he says demon. So I haven’t seen him but once this year. I’ll see him for his birthday month next month.
I wish I had called and asked questions about our family. Now there's no one to ask.
Sorry to hear about your mom.
Thank you.
I wish you would take your podcast live like a town hall and travel to different cities to try and reach those who don’t podcast. You are doing such a great service, I wish more people were listening. I share with friends but cannot guarantee they listen. Great article- sorry I got a bit sidetracked. Sharon in Houston