Josh Marshall

1 week ago | talkingpointsmemo.com | Josh Marshall

I’m seeing a lot of articles about Trump’s turn on Iran, how it’s pressure from Israel, his evolving views. I think these are all either overblown or irrelevant. As I noted earlier, what’s driving Trump here is the hunger to get in on a “win”. It might be best to see it as a typical Trumpian branding exercise. Israel has got a product ready to go to market and they’ve offered Trump the opportunity to slap the Trump name on it. But even beyond all that there’s something more.

1 week ago | talkingpointsmemo.com | Josh Marshall

I haven’t had a lot to say about Israel and Iran because I haven’t had a lot to add. But I want to suggest something about the possible entry of the United States into the war. These aren’t conclusions, more questions I’ve had and questions that help me frame how I’ve looked at what’s happening.

1 week ago | talkingpointsmemo.com | Josh Marshall

There’s a good piece in the Post today by Philip Bump making an important corrective point which is that “no” we shouldn’t assume that millions of people going out and protesting against Donald Trump is actually great news for Donald Trump. The issue is sort of over-learning the fairly questionable lesson of the George Floyd protests, thinking that they somehow redounded to Trump’s benefit. As Bump notes, there’s pretty little evidence that this is true.

1 week ago | talkingpointsmemo.com | Josh Marshall

Not the biggest thing in the world. But it caught my attention. The Trump family is rolling out something called Trump Mobile, which is basically a mobile phone service for real Americans. It has all the standard stuff you’d get with a phone service, in theory. Digging under the hood reveals it just sits on top of the existing networks. But that’s true of most independent services. The big thing is that it will sell you a Trump branded and made in America phone.

1 week ago | talkingpointsmemo.com | Josh Marshall

In recent days I’ve seen a number of comments or editorials which focus on a dichotomy between reacting to the crisis of the moment (which is portrayed as the ICE raids, military deployments and general attacks on democracy) and focusing on issues like Medicaid (which is portrayed as politics as usual and an inability to recognize a national crisis.) I agree with the sentiment behind this but it’s wrongheaded and I want to explain why.