KUMBAYA, DEMOCRATS

Pour yourself a glass of bourbon and come together

A Splash of Bourbon

THE SONG “KUMBAYA” is a cultural reference point that most of us share, but I bet you didn’t know all this: “Kumbaya” originates from the Gullah language—a unique African-American Creole spoken in the Sea Islands of South Carolina and Georgia—and literally translates to “Come by here.” First recorded in the 1920s, the song was a deeply spiritual, raw appeal for divine intervention amid suffering, with lyrics calling on God to aid those who were crying and praying. By the mid-20th century, it transitioned into a folk song and a staple of Scout and church camps, transforming the haunting spiritual into a universal anthem of blissful unity, harmony, and shared humanity. I sang it. My daughters sang it. Did you?

An anthem of unity. This is something the Democrats desperately need. But today’s political arena requires a much tougher brand of solidarity than a campfire circle, a reality made clear by Senator Bill Cassidy’s recent race.

It’s no surprise that Cassidy lost the U.S. Senate race in Louisiana to Trump-endorsed U.S. Rep. Julia Letlow. Louisiana is the MAGA South, and don’t forget Louisiana’s deeply ingrained, nationwide reputation for political corruption. When I lived in South Arkansas for a couple of strange years, I saw the political TV ads from Louisiana, and they were wild. They also can be a source of great hilarity. If you educate yourself about Louisiana and its politics, you see where James Carville got his core sense of place, as well as his political know-how.

Now—and especially if you’re in the South—go immediately to your nearest gas station that sells good crispy-and-still-perfectly-juicy-inside fried chicken, and then pour yourself a bit of bourbon and set a spell, while we review the latest facts of this Trump Regime’s ruination of our country.

Gas Station Fried Chicken

Senator Cassidy had the audacity to show some backbone, having voted to impeach Trump during the president’s 2021 second trial. For that, the two-term incumbent became the first sitting U.S. senator in over a decade to lose a primary after facing Trump backlash. With The Donald, anyone with morality, ethics, or integrity—anyone who wants to do right by the American people—is an enemy of the state.

Six other Republicans also dared vote to convict Trump for “incitement of insurrection.” And while the final Senate vote was a clear majority 57–43 to convict, it fell 10 votes short of the strict two-thirds vote that was required. In other words, after most Americans saw the televised attempted coup violently playing out at the U.S. Capitol Building, a majority of Republican senators still voted to bow down to Trump rather than to uphold their Constitutional oath. The oath:

that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.’‘ (5 U.S.C. 3331.)

For a group of would-be fanatics who go on and on about what good Christians they are and how much they love their God, and ours is a Christian nation/blah blah blah (which it is not—read Heather Cox Richardson’s excellent May 17^th piece about this very subject here), I’d say this is a huge insult to God Themselves.

Trump stamped Cassidy a “disloyal disaster,” but I will virtually knight him right here and now with a title that most of GOP members shamefully fail to deserve: Sir Republican with Integrity. That doesn’t mean that Cassidy isn’t conservative; it just means he made decisions to do the right thing instead of being one of Trump’s perpetual toadies. Cassidy is a medical doctor, the chair of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, and he cares greatly about vaccines and public health, as opposed to the guy who will likely take his place—Senator Roger Marshall (R-Kan), who is aligned with RFK Jr.’s nutty thoughts about vaccines and is angling for the job. Even if Cassidy voted to put RFK Jr. in his current position—the entire GOP did—he bucked RFK Jr. when he started tearing down our public health.

Covid-19 Vaccine

A reminder: These are the seven GOP senators who kept their oaths and crossed party lines to vote for Trump’s impeachment:

• 1. Bill Cassidy (Louisiana)

• 2. Susan Collins (Maine)

• 3. Lisa Murkowski (Alaska)

• 4. Mitt Romney (Utah)

• 5. Ben Sasse (Nebraska)

• 6. Pat Toomey (Pennsylvania)

• 7. Richard Burr (North Carolina)

Four of the seven—Burr, Toomey, Romney, and Sasse—opted not to seek reelection or left politics entirely. (Romney is the only one who had the pleasure of voting to impeach Trump twice.) Susan Collins is running again this year and is vulnerable to lose her seat. Her opponent, Graham Platner, is a dream candidate. He’s a 41-year-old Marine Corps veteran and oyster farmer who grew up in a liberal household but enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps, ultimately serving four tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. Before launching his campaign, he worked as a Downeast Maine oyster farmer and a local harbor master. His working-class roots give him street cred, and he has relied heavily on small-dollar grassroots donations to outraise his primary competitors. Described as “more Bernie than Bernie,” he has an economic platform that has earned the official endorsement of Senator Bernie Sanders. Like Mamdani in New York City, Platner is exactly the kind of candidate the Democratic Party desperately needs in order to change our future.

For years, Bernie Sanders has been telling Democrats and the American public what we needed to do, and, despite the DNC’s trying to shut him down, he’s proven to be a soothsayer: Tax the billionaires and help working-class and middle-class people live a better life with a livable wage, health care and education for all. Why has that been so hard for Democrats to endorse? Because the old corporate Democrats like to reap the same benefits as Republicans—or, again like Republicans, they buy the same old misinformed and destructive tropes about “Socialism.”

Photo by Vidar Nordli-Mathisen on Unsplash

Americans have been screaming for Democrats to renew who we are and what we stand for since 2016, and Bernie was the change choice for Democrats and Independents in 2016. But when Hillary became the candidate, many threw their votes to Trump. He turned out to be a change agent, all right—changing our lives to a chasm of misery.

As Robert Reich suggested Trump’s next Republican target in the House was Kentucky representative Thomas Massie, who had the guts to oppose U.S. military involvement in Iran, demand release of the Epstein files, and criticize Trump’s spending bills for adding to the national debt.

I proudly knight Massie as well, and toast him too. (Clink-Clink) Trump is invested in taking any good man down. His corruption is a cancer on this country.

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THE REPUBLICAN CONGRESS is not composed of independent thinkers and doers. Instead, they’re a group of conservative sheep marching in goose-step behind Trump and his greedy, corrupt, Christian nationalist-fascist agenda—even when they see the destruction that is engulfing the United States and our place in world order. The decline of the United States is what Timothy Snyder is calling “Superpower Suicide.”

Empires have risen and failed before, but to my knowledge no state has ever chosen to kill its own power, and succeeded with such rapidity.

It is hard to see this clearly. Even as we oppose individual Trump adventures, we hope that in some way they are based on some understanding of the national interest. They are not.

The perfect example of a Trump co-conspirator is South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham. “Those who try to destroy Trump politically, stand in the way of his agenda, are gonna lose,” Graham told NBC News. “Bill Cassidy lost because he tried to destroy Trump. This is the party of Donald Trump.” Like almost the entire GOP, Graham sold out to Trump. And for what? People keep asking what Trump has on Graham. Nobody knows the answer, but a lot of people talk about this, which is so far an unsubstantiated claim:

For Senator Graham, the monikers “Lady G” and “ladybugs” were initiated by a June 2020 “X” post from gay adult-film performer Sean Harding, that Graham allegedly used male escorts. Following this, online narratives surfaced alleging that “Lady G” was a preferred nickname and that escorts referred to distinct body moles as “ladybugs.” In a June 4, 2020, post, Harding wrote: “Every sex worker I know has been hired by this man. Wondering if enough of us spoke out if that could get him out of office? ... If you’d be willing to stand with me against LG please let me know.”

These claims, which generated a lot of online discussion regarding political hypocrisy and “outing” politicians, remain unproven and have not been publicly addressed by Graham.

One of the comments underneath the “X” post: Sex workers saving America is the happy ending we all need right now.

And let me just say that Graham’s opponent in his own race this year is Dr. Annie Andrews, who is a pediatrician, a mom, and one helluva smart woman with a mission. I went to a fundraiser for her a while back. She is impressive. Andrews understands the issues and what needs to be done about them, and she articulates it all like a pro. She’s sharp-witted and astute, on issue, approachable, and beautiful—all in all another dream candidate. Democrats in South Carolina, get yourselves out in force and move her to the winning position.

A Brief Aside: Whether Graham is gay or not, what’s so damaging about conservative people in authority who are loudly anti-LGBTQIA+ (while hiding in the closet and practicing gay sex) is the intolerance and hate that they’re loading into the consciousness. This is violence against people who are just trying to be who they are and live their lives. Here’s a piece in Pink News from 2016 called “11 anti-gay preachers who got caught doing very gay things.”And here’s a 2024 article in Pride called “10 ‘family values’ Republicans caught in gay sex scandals proving they are GIANT hypocrites.”

Take a look at these lists and think of the harm these men and women have caused, but also think of their own self-hatred. Their hypocrisy violates our deep-rooted expectations of fairness, trust, and social cooperation. Their deception threatens our well-being and makes us mad as hell. Doesn’t everybody hate a hypocrite?

***

POLLING AND PUBLIC opinion analyst G. Elliott Morris from Strength in Numbers says the Democrats can still win the House in the 2026 Midterms. I hope he’s right. In a conversation with Paul Krugman:

Morris: Big picture is: as long as Democrats are still winning the popular vote by four points, they’re still taking back the House of Representatives… I think the 2026 election will be significantly pro-Democratic, and that the gerrymandering won’t matter. It won’t matter in terms of who wins the majority of the seats. Democrats will still be down six seats, at least, from where they should be. But if they’re gaining twelve, then, you know, they’re still managing to recapture the House because it was so close last time.

… in 2028, when we’re not expecting Democrats to have such a large wave—unless the country comes to its senses…Then we’re expecting a much closer election. And in that 2028 scenario, this gerrymandering could give Republicans the majority, even if Democrats win the popular vote.

Democrats have a chance to move forward, because Trump’s war with Iran and the resulting spikes in energy costs, consumer inflation surging to 3.8%, and national gas prices rising by roughly $1.50 per gallon with no end in sight has showcased his complete incompetence. Despite his pathological lies, the American people are hurting, and they finally understand that Trump is to blame—at least for this. (Of course, the hard-core MAGA remain blind to Trump’s faults.) And there’s the loss of health care, food aid, and Trump’s corruption. “Granted, we already knew that Trump was, by orders of magnitude, the most corrupt president in U.S. history,” wrote Paul Krugman. “But now Trump is the most explicitly corrupt leader in today’s world.”

Strait of Hormuz

According to Phillips P. O’Brien, a specialist in modern military history and international relations, the U.S. failed its strategic goals with Iran, basically lost Trump’s war with Iran very quickly, but not before creating global chaos and making us less safe—and according to The New York Times spending roughly $1billion a day to do it. O’Brien has also referred to Trump’s trip to China as “A Case Study of U.S. Decline.” I recommend his newsletter.

Trump is losing at home. And globally, world leaders no longer kiss his ass to gain his support. They literally see how demented and/or crazy he is by his very public insulting and childish tweets. They know he’s incompetent. They can’t trust him. Instead of supporting democracy, he has sided with illiberalism and autocracy—Putin and Orban, who just lost his critical election despite Trump’s support. Europe is making their own fresh world order with alliances that benefit them.

What do Democrats need to do now? We need to come together with a unified strategy to meet the 2026 mid-terms, as well as 2028. I was recently with a group of Democrats who wanted to talk about who everyone thought the best presidential candidate would be. “It’s too early,” I said. “We need to see where the energy and movement is, who appeals to the young people. The right person will rise up.” The DNC has been shoving their candidates down our throats, and Joe Biden screwed us—first by running for re-election, and then by decreeing that Kamala be the candidate. But we’ve got good people who will run. Frankly, the person I’ll support will be the one I think can beat the Republican candidate. That’s the test. Unfortunately, it won’t be a woman or a gay man, and it also won’t be a person of color. Not now anyway.

Last week, the Harris deputy campaign manager and digital director, Rob Flaherty, offered a blunt post-mortem on Harris’s 2024 campaign strategy for The Bulwark. The first big problem he mentioned: You have to have a brand. The Harris campaign didn’t.

People often think of a campaign’s brand as visual—the logo, for instance—but really it’s the story of why the candidate got into the race. That “why” is critical, and we couldn’t clearly articulate it.

As a writer, I know this: Story is everything. It’s in every part of your life and in everything you see and do, even if you don’t recognize it. It’s in how you perceive things. It’s part of every business, every message. It’s why you buy products. Every success has a good story. And under the surface of life, story and mythology inhabit the rhythms of the collective unconscious.

Another problem he mentioned:

We underestimated then—and are underestimating now—just how disillusioned people are. There was and is a pervasive sense that nothing works and the institutions holding us up have failed.

This is a mainstream Democrat/DNC failing, and there’s no excuse for it. Like I said earlier, for years our people have been screaming for change, and the “official” Democrats haven’t listened. The DNC’s arrogance of picking the candidates they wanted instead of who we wanted hasn’t worked. A lot of people—including young voters—have been put off by Democrats because they keep running corporate candidates, people they owe and/or want in power instead of someone who brings true growth. What happened to the party since the Clintons is that Democrats became Republicans Light, and the DNC became the face of that. And as much as I love the Obamas, they also slid into that corporate Democrat mold and didn’t initiate the metamorphosis we’d hoped for. And losing that Supreme Court seat—that Obama didn’t get to fill—killed us.

Another point for me: Flaherty says he’s addressing the elephant in the room, which is that Biden shouldn’t have run. Duh. That was no secret to most of us. We knew it and said it over and over again. David Axelrod told us Biden couldn’t win, and guess what? Again, the Democrats weren’t listening. Biden wasn’t listening. His people, including Jill, weren’t listening. Instead, they were letting a way-too-old man feed his not-thinking-straight ego.

One last important point for me that Flaherty made:

It’s hard not to look at the success of an affordability message in the time since the campaign and wonder what would have been if we had focused just on that.

FFS. Again, Bernie has been hitting this loudly and proudly for years—trying to get Democrats to listen and understand this Progressive POV. That’s baseline crucial.

***

SO, DEMOCRATS, DIG in to some of that good fried chicken and drink up. Listen to the people. Feel what’s happening in your culture. Look at the issues and think about the future, and figure out how to get young people involved. In other words, do not do what you’ve done before.

While cynics might use “Kumbaya” to mock naive idealism, that old song carries a very strong message: Reclaiming the spiritual’s true Gullah roots provides a fierce, urgent blueprint for strategic solidarity. We Democrats must drop superficial bickering, get smart, and forge a genuinely unbreakable, unified front. Kumbaya, Democrats. It’s high time to get your shit together.

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Kumbaya, Democrats. Come by here. And then get to work.

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