Ben Domenech

Since the death of Jordan Neely on the New York City subway, the media elite have rushed to maintain that he died not just from a chokehold, but the systemically racist, capitalist, selfish system that regularly fails homeless people. The headlines: "Jordan Neely Was Already Dead: New York reckons with a homeless epidemic and a killing." "How New York City failed Jordan Neely." "Jordan Neely’s death reflects the inhumane consequences of being homeless, experts say." Ah, those experts, who are always right and never wrong. Except, of course, when they are provably wrong.

Kevin McCarthy rose to the speakership despite being loathed by a lot of very online conservatives and a rump portion of his own party in the House. He had to win that role across multiple votes, which the media pronounced as humiliating, indicative of a GOP incapable of governing and all the normal tropes that partisans such as Jake Tapper deploy in place of real informed analysis of the situation. This is why they’ve proven to be so utterly wrong about McCarthy’s strength as a leader since taking the gavel.

Joe Biden’s campaign officially launched with a video released in the early morning hours featuring a message bizarrely limited in its focus to a single threat: the return of Donald Trump. https://youtu.be/ChjibtX0UzU Of course Trump is the odds-on favorite to be the next Republican nominee, but Biden’s announcement ad had none of the optimism you typically see from incumbent campaigns proud of what they've achieved. If the economy is doing as well as the White House regularly claims, you'd think that would be at the center of his launch and appeal for re-election. Instead, the mood of this ad was dark and foreboding — fear the Donnie from over the sea and his dark and terrible return! Biden’s team is doubling down on their 2022 strategy with this approach.

It is an irony of history that the bronze Statue of Freedom which stands tall atop the US Capitol dome was commissioned by the man who would seek to break the nation apart a few years later. Jefferson Davis, secretary of war when the statue was ordered, clashed with Yankee sculptor Thomas Crawford over his original design, which included a liberty cap, the symbol of an emancipated slave, above the statue’s crown. The statue is adorned with a sword, a shield and a wreath of victory. It’s symbolic in other ways as well: struck hundreds of times by lightning, it conducts and dissipates that violent energy into the earth. Freedom makes an excellent lightning rod. Today, critiques of the statue and what it represents arise from different sources.

I sometimes think about how left-wing news anchor John Harwood opened a line of questioning during a CNBC presidential debate: John Harwood: Mr. Trump, you’ve done very well on this campaign so far by promising to build a wall and make another country pay for it. Donald Trump: Right. Harwood: Send 11 million people out of the country, cut taxes $10 trillion without increasing the deficit. Trump: Right. John: And make Americans better off because your greatness would replace the stupidity and incompetence of others. Trump: That’s right. John: Let’s be honest. Is this a comic book version of a presidential campaign? Trump: It’s not a comic book, and it’s not a very nicely asked question, the way you say that.

There are moments in history when politicians have to seize an opportunity or watch it pass them by, never to be seen again. We all know the examples. Chris Christie has nightmares about them. But we may be witnessing one of those right now in the Democratic Party, for one of its youngest voices. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez could be missing her moment. I know that this is the earliest cycle that AOC could potentially even run for president. But the uniquely fragile status of the leader of her party leaves an opening that is clear as day: to upend the hidebound octogenarians of the Democratic elite with a brash, social-media friendly progressive coalition that speaks to the party as it is, not as the establishment imagines it to be.