There's no such thing as an adolescent silverback. A silverback is a fully mature dominant male. They don't gain the silver coloration until they are mature, so the entire premise is a contradiction in terms.

I wonder what other hugely unpopular positions they can poison themselves with. This is what minority rule looks like. The only way we stop this is by defeating Trump and reforming our democracy. Minorities should have enough power to protect themselves from oppression, but not so much that they can impose their views on the rest of the country. This is what's happening with the far right, which very much is a minority that's far out of step with mainstream American opinion on virtually everything.

He hasn't. With a handful of obvious exceptions, the entire Republican leadership has spent the last four years running a clinic in cowardice, pathetic boot-licking and groveling.

Have you considered that there might be a great deal of regional variation such that while it seems "ridiculous" in your particular region and social context, in other parts of the country people are operating on an entirely different set of "received" facts about reality?

I pose this question because if the last decade has taught us anything, it's that we cannot take for granted that we are all operating on the basis of the same "facts" with regard to history and reality.

Yes.

This seems mostly right, but I want to add a few points.

The first is that the Ukrainians won't stop fighting if the west stops supporting them. They may suffer some severe defeats and the nature of the war may shift to being more of a guerrilla insurgency, but they won't stop fighting.

The second is that even if the US withdraws support, it's not likely that European nations will necessarily follow, and between Germany and the UK and France, the Europeans can easily continue to support Ukraine at or above current levels.

My final point is that Ukraine actually is making slow progress in pushing back the Russians, it's just not going anywhere near as fast as anyone would like.

I also really dislike the term "stalemate" because it implies a static state of affairs as in a chess game where there are only so many pieces and moves, when in fact war is much different in the sense that additional pieces and moves can and probably will be added to the equation.

False dichotomy.

I love how most of the comments here are about how much everyone hates Hillary rather than about what she actually said. I get it that people hate her, but let's be real folks; Trump is the only relevant clear and present danger here. Bitching about Hillary seems pretty pointless at this point.

This is very very bad for Trump because Powell is also a defendant in Jack Smith's federal case being tried under Judge Chutkan.

Powell obviously knows that her guilty plea in Georgia can and will be used by Smith in the federal case, so what it basically says is that she's going to be a cooperating witness (she really has no choice) for Smith as well.

Powell was there at the infamous December 18th meeting wherein things like shutting down all voting and declaring martial law were allegedly discussed. This in turn means that she can provide convincing and potentially damning evidence as to Trump's knowledge of and intent with regard to how the election had actually played out, and specifically with regard to his desire to overturn it.

There's a lot more to be said about this, but I have to go make dinner.

McCarthy is selling himself short here. He deserves at least a little credit for this clusterfuck as well. All of these cowards deserve credit. After January 6 they all had the chance to stand up and do the right thing and wrest control of the GOP from Trump and the crazies, but no, they were all too scared.

While I hate her politics, I have nothing but respect for Liz Cheney.

That's a pretty tall claim. Maybe the worst SCOTUS in your lifetime, but if you know anything of US history, you'd know that calling it the worst SCOTUS of all time is a pretty tall order.

No, it's authoritarianism vs democracy. It's a very well-known concept in political science that authoritarian regimes can make decisions and execute on them far faster than democracies. The problem is that autocratic decision making ultimately creates instability by implementing policies and decisions that don't have a broad base of stakeholder support. Why should any citizen support a decision that was made without their input or consent?