No Masters
Archive: Sept. 18, 2022
Friends! We are 50 days from the midterm elections. You’re likely wondering: why am I not getting more unsolicited emails about this? Good news. This is one.
I started writing these ahead of the last election as a hobby and some people liked them (thanks, dad). If you want to opt out just reply back, no worries. By design, there is no way to reply all with “unsubscribe.” :)
I write these because I believe Winning Elections Is Very Important. Probably even underrated in importance.
No party is perfect. But extremely close elections in my lifetime have led to everything from a horrific war in Iraq, to the federal right to abortion overturned this summer thanks to less than 100,000 carefully placed votes. And some good stuff recently, like a climate bill that, while only a start, should reduce US carbon emissions by 40 percent in eight years, and $20K in student debt canceled for the average US borrower, leaving nearly half of 40+ million borrowers with zero balance.
But most alarming for me this year: the integrity of the 2024 election is, sadly, on the ballot, with Republicans nominating candidates at all levels openly running on stealing elections going forward. Including most GOP senate candidates. OK, enough preaching.
Dark Brandon
An insightful tweet from a pundit right after Biden won: “Congratulations to Republicans on their victory in the 2022 midterms!” American voters basically always punish the party in power.
Until last month, Republicans were expected to take both the House and Senate. Enter Trump, who has endorsed a bunch of extreme, frankly odd candidates. And add a string of big legislative wins from the Dems, sparking the Dark Brandon meme – the joke being that Biden quietly masterminded not only these wins, but also stuff mostly beyond his control, like gas prices dropping or overseas jobs returning.
Biden remains unpopular. But he’s grown slightly more popular – and the math minds at FiveThirtyEight thinks the Dem senate candidates are now a favorite to overcome Biden’s unpopularity and narrowly edge out a tiny majority.
I have real trust issues with polls after they missed so badly in 2016 and 2020. But Mitch McConnell is worried enough to call out his own party’s “candidate quality” this election and in a thinly veiled fundraising plea.
That being said, Republicans remain a strong favorite to take back the House, which would prevent essentially any legislation from being passed, and lead to circus-like hearings on lord knows what. But holding the Democratic senate would allow Dems to continue to make appointments, including lifetime judges, which Trump was startlingly good at, and avoid Republicans quickly impeaching (but not removing from office) Biden.
“Dark Enlightenment”
There are five core senate races that could use your attention – Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Each of these are links to donate.
Nevada is the most overlooked, and thus the race that needs donations the most. But Arizona is more interesting, in a perverse way:
Incumbent senator, astronaut, and one-time Snapchat user Mark Kelly is facing a uniquely odd and, frankly, dangerous candidate: 36-year-old investor Blake Masters.
Being uniquely odd is saying something this year, as Republican candidates are bizarre: QAnonners, testicle tanning, hosting authoritarian conferences in Hungary, etc.
Being uniquely dangerous is also a competition. “Normal” Republican senators have proposed a federal abortion ban after fifteen weeks, and striking down all federal legislation every five years, forcing our famously deadlocked congress to repass everything from Social Security to Medicare (full, wild PDF here). Only a handful of the fifty senate Republicans say they back same-sex marriage, which over 70% of Americans support.
Masters goes further. He claims Trump won in 2020, supports impeaching Biden and “imprisoning” Fauci, speculated two months ago that the FBI organized January 6, supports halving legal immigration, advocates privatizing tons of things, like water, etc. How did he get in this position?
In college, Masters was a very-online libertarian posting ideas on forums about bodybuilding and guns: “‘I don’t mean any disrespect — but it takes years to understand where I’m coming from, let alone agree or disagree,’ a beleaguered Mr. Masters posted on a CrossFit message board in 2007,” writes Sam Adler-Bell in NYT. I know the feeling, Blake.
Masters took a class from billionaire investor Peter Thiel (you may be familiar with “Facebook”), who was also a libertarian. He was very into Thiel’s lectures and turned his personal class notes into a book, and then worked directly for Thiel investing his money.
After Obama first won, Thiel decided that even conservative libertarianism was too lefty, writing “I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible,” and that he “was losing confidence that unfettered capitalism, alone, would lead to a better future.”
But when Trump beat the odds to become president, Thiel and Masters decided that democracy was a-okay – but just this once, to usher in a brand of right-wing authoritarianism they had been exploring. They had befriended and popularized the work of “Dark Enlightenment” philosopher and coder Curtis Yarvin, who wants America to be a conservative monarchy. While Masters calls America a “dystopian hell-world,” and Yarvin muses about how Trump or a similar figure could seize dictatorial power through a better organized Jan. 6. Masters cites Yarvin on the campaign trail, and Ohio’s GOP senate nominee, fellow former Thiel employee J.D. Vance, is also a Yarvin supporter. New levels of dark and weird.
While it’s unlikely these folks share every political view, they are clearly aligned on a wide array of radical ideas for our future. I’d recommend Adler-Bell’s full piece.
What about Mark Kelly? He is something I support: a reliable Democratic senate vote out of Arizona. Kyrsten Sinema, please take notes.
What Should You Do?
Volunteer: Calls may be as effective as door-knocking, which is good news if you don’t live near a swing district (although you might be surprised: House map). SwingLeft.com or Indivisible make this super easy.
Message Friends: Guilting one person into voting is like doubling your vote. Search “friends in Arizona” on Facebook, and message them something like: “Hi XX, sorry to bug, but I made a pact with my friend that we’d message every FB friend in swing states to remind them to vote in the midterms in ~50 days. I’m almost 100% sure you’re registered and voting, but a promise is a promise! iwillvote.com. :) And please remind your friends!” Yes, I recommended this in 2020. Key states are Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, Wisconsin, Georgia, Nevada, Arizona, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire.
The End
If you don’t email me back to not send you these (which is fine), you will receive another one soon. That is a threat. And if you read this far and enjoyed it, you can send a tip on my behalf to … one of the candidates above. :)