Abbreviated pundit roundup: Biden arranges Brittney Griner's return, and takes the heat for it

[Brexiter]

Leaders make tough calls. Ideologues make what they can of other people's courage to lead.

Bloomberg:

Biden’s One-for-One Griner Swap Stirs Unease Alongside Elation

• Freeing arms dealer a “deeply disturbing” move, Menendez Says
• Other Democrats, allies praise Biden for getting Griner home

Kevin McCarthy, who is in line to become Speaker of the House next month, said that trading Bout without getting Whelan is an “unconscionable” move and a “a gift to Vladimir Putin.”

The swap may not be such a clear-cut win for Putin, according to Thomas Warrick, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council. He said the irony is “they don’t really want Viktor Bout back.”

Prisoner swaps are difficult, fraught, full of questions and red meat for ideologues pushing an agenda. Why did we leave someone behind? What about the guy we let loose? Why not last month? etc etc etc
P.S. A reminder about the war in Ukraine being a factor. (We aren't friends with Russia.)
The above matters for White House framing but it also matters for news organizations trying to prove they're independent of the White House. Guaranteed some will overcompensate.

Underscoring why Warnock’s win was such an important victory for Democrats #gapol #gasen https://t.co/zrW0OpcRlZ

— Greg Bluestein (@bluestein) December 9, 2022

The effect is closer to negligible than devastating. She’ll caucus with Dems, keep committee assignments, be the same PIA. But it makes Rev. Warnock’s election that much more important.

Note that she waited before he won (and AZ GOP lost) before announcing. And she didn't want to be embarrassed in a D primary loss

If the winds are in her favor by election time she wants to be Lisa Murkowski. If not, she leaves on her own terms.

Andra Gillespie/The Conversation:

Georgia runoff: Candidate quality meant fewer Republicans turned out for Walker

Runoff elections tend to be races of attrition. Turnout will most likely be lower, as voters are less accustomed to turning out for off-cycle elections. Candidates, then, must try to minimize attrition among their supporters, and the one with the least erosion is most likely to win.

Such was the case in Georgia on Dec. 6, 2022. Fewer people voted for either candidate in the runoff: Sen. Raphael Warnock, the Democratic incumbent, saw the number of people who turned out to vote for him drop by about 131,000 from the November vote; Republican Herschel Walker lost closer to 200,000 voters. This would explain how Warnock was able to grow his lead in the runoff.

Those eager to attack Biden for making a tough decision & securing Brittney Griner's release are negligent in their hot takes. They're playing into Putin's hand & feeding the Russian propaganda machine against Americans, which ultimately also works against Paul Whelan's release.

— Olivia of Troye (@OliviaTroye) December 8, 2022

Aaron Blake/WaPo:

Why Herschel Walker might be the most embarrassing 2022 loss for Trump

The reasons for his growing margin of defeat are pretty evident. Walker benefited on Election Day from being on the same ballot as those other Republicans, especially Gov. Brian Kemp (R), who turned out enough Republicans who were willing to check the box for Walker to keep it close.


But when they weren’t on the ballot, Walker suffered — particularly among conservatives in the Atlanta area. Of the 15 counties where Walker’s raw number of votes dropped the most between Nov. 8 and Tuesday, 12 of them were either Atlanta-based counties or in the Atlanta suburbs and exurbs.


It’s no coincidence that this is the part of the state where Walker most underperformed Kemp on Election Day. Georgians were reluctant to vote for both; then they were reluctant to turn out for Walker when it was only him on the ballot. And he bled those votes.

…

Georgia was happy to vote for Republicans this year. That just didn’t extend to Walker. And given Walker’s demonstrated failure to turn out Kemp voters and his relatively small margin of defeat, he provides perhaps the most compelling case of the 2022 election that Trump cost Republicans a seat.

this is incredibly dumb — @NYTimesGuild doing a walkout vs a full-on strike isn't a sign of a weak union but a strategic one that understands the importance of gradual escalation https://t.co/bnYiNA569X

— Jessica Schulberg (@jessicaschulb) December 8, 2022

Isaac Arnsdorf/WaPo:

Trump’s isolation deepens as Georgia loss adds to 2024 bid’s rocky start


The former president’s three-week-old campaign is reeling from a string of controversies and setbacks


Trump’s seclusion within the ornate walls of his club and a series of controversies — from the dinner with antisemites Ye and Nick Fuentes to a social media post suggesting the “termination” of the Constitution — have left him increasingly isolated within his party as he tries to mount a political comeback. Walker’s loss in a Tuesday runoff election became the latest blow, prompting more Republicans to join the chorus faulting him for dragging down the party’s performance in this year’s midterms.


“The former president presents our biggest risk of losing for 2024, and conservatives are tired of losing,” said Bob Vander Plaats, head of the Family Leader, an Iowa-based social conservative group. “Even the former president’s announcement is being greeted like it never happened. There’s no buzz amongst my network at all.”

The Bob Vander Plaats quote is way more important than indifference or tepid opinion from D.C. politicians. It’s the base that decides Trump’s future, not D.C. elites.

I thought something was odd about the bizarre news stories from yesterday about how Trump's lawyers conducted a search and turned over two more classified documents and made noise about how this means they are cooperating and being transparent. Something was brewing. https://t.co/4vSLPOrF0w

— Teri Kanefield (@Teri_Kanefield) December 8, 2022

Steve Benen/MSNBC:

Why some Republicans have created a Senate ‘Breakfast Club’

In the midterms' wake, some Senate Republicans have decided that the smart move is to be more partisan, more confrontational, and more reactionary.

In theory, after an intra-party contingent took aim at Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and missed — it was the first leadership challenge the Kentucky Republican ever faced — the party had an opportunity to close ranks, move forward, and come to terms with the disappointing reality of another two years in the minority.

Indeed, common sense might suggest that the Republicans who rallied against McConnell would have to hope that they didn’t face his retaliatory wrath. (The phrase, “You come at the king, you best not miss” keeps coming to mind.)

But in practice, the party’s far-right faction has different plans in mind. Politico reported:

About a half-dozen Republican senators, most of whom publicly opposed Mitch McConnell as their leader last month, are getting more organized in a bid to exert their leverage in the chamber. ... These GOP senators have been quietly meeting on a regular basis to strategize future battles worth picking within McConnell’s ranks, and they’re set to call a special conference meeting next week to start a broader debate within the Republican conference.

The initiative apparently includes Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Rand Paul of Kentucky, Mike Braun of Indiana, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, Mike Lee of Utah, Ted Cruz of Texas, and Rick Scott of Florida.

Great visual on how the Georgia vote shifted between the 11/8 election and 12/6 runoff. Walker improved in rural north Georgia, especially in Marjorie Taylor Greene's district. Warnock did better in 77 counties, including the vote-rich metro Atlanta.https://t.co/QqJnOmk571 pic.twitter.com/ujXqJKyzJu

— Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) December 7, 2022

Joe Perticone/Bulwark:

House Republicans ‘May Dig Their Own Grave’ With Fringe Political Investigations

The contrast between the two chambers may become quite pronounced during the 118th Congress.

Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine told The Bulwark Senate Democrats could pick up the slack where these investigations have fallen off in the House. Whether they will need to do so depends on which route Republicans take over the next two years—a serious one, or a frivolous detour.

“We may do some of our own work here to tell a more accurate story—that would depend on what the investigation is,” he said. “But if the House wants to go from a legislative body into a body that’s just trying to get headlines on weird investigations, they may feel like at the end of the day they can pat themselves on the back because they got on a cable news TV show. But I don’t think they’re going to be impressing their voters.”

This is where Rev. Warnock’s victory matters. The Democrats can, indeed, do “some of our own work here” with Senate subpoena power, thanks to a 51st vote. That’s based on committee organizing rules.

If you charged people $5 to vote, you wouldn't bankrupt many people, and the effects on voter participation in pivotal election states would also probably be small. But poll taxes are still wrong, as are "time taxes" (to borrow @AnnieLowrey's formulation) that cost hours of time https://t.co/peAXwuby23

— Kevin Collins (@kwcollins) December 7, 2022

Never was Upton Sinclair more relevant than in analyzing the above tweets.

“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” — Upton Sinclair.

Ed Kilgore/New York:

Will Biden’s Primary-Calendar Power Play Actually Work?


The first major issue is that there’s not really a national primary system; national parties can nudge states, but ultimately each one sets its own primary date.

In Georgia, the secretary of State (currently Republican Brad Raffensperger) sets the presidential-primary date for both parties. One of Raffensperger’s deputies suggested moving the Democratic primary to Tuesday, February 13, a week after New Hampshire and Nevada vote. This was a nonstarter, as the Washington Post reported:

Deputy Secretary of State Jordan Fuchs told The Washington Post on Monday that Georgia would not change its historical primary schedule if it cost either party delegates and would not hold different primary dates for Democrats and Republicans in 2024.


Officials at the Republican National Committee — which already has set a calendar that would punish Georgia if its primary is held before Super Tuesday, when a raft of contests are held — have said there are no plans to revisit the rules.

The RNC, you see, forbids any states other than Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina from holding contests prior to March 1 and imposes a heavy penalty in lost delegates for states that try to jump over the velvet rope.

More importantly, the point I make here is that this moment is one of real weakness for Donald Trump, but Republicans can’t just do nothing and hope he goes away. That have to DO SOMETHING. https://t.co/RTssHFa5tv

— Sarah Longwell (@SarahLongwell25) December 7, 2022