DL Open Thread 9/25

Now that Nancy Pelosi has finally overcome the fear of monsters under her bed, pundits are writing pieces on how the Democrats might screw it up. At least the headlines won’t say “Democrats in disarray” for a while.

As this piece points out, Trump’s “explanations” of the Ukraine phone call have been all over the map, making it impossible to believe any explanation he now offers. The transcript released by the White House this morning shows Trump offered Ukraine’s president U.S. assistance in investigating Joe Biden, so lying about that appears to be off the table.

Remember when Trump signed a bipartisan criminal justice reform bill? No? Good. Trump hopes his supporters will forget about it, too. He apparently chewed out Jared Kushner for pushing legislation that Trump thinks his base will hate.

Why is America so polarized? It might be because the country’s economy is so polarized. In a study tracking economic growth by congressional district from 2008 to 2018, districts represented by Democrats saw average GDP per resident rise by an inflation-adjusted 35.9%, while Republican districts suffered a 2.1% decline. Even though Democrats in 2018 held fewer seats, 235, than they did in a decade earlier, 256, the share of the nation’s total gross national product created in Democratic districts grew from 60.6 to 63.6 percent.

What do you want to talk about?