The Week That Is (So Far)

Too much to keep up with, so I'll be brief . . .

The Democratic presidential debate two days ago (October 15) showed that, even if she's not really the front runner for the party's presidential nomination, Elizabeth Warren has surged to the point where she's being taken seriously.  All of the candidates - even Joe Biden - grilled her on her policies, specifically on how she'd pay for Medicare health coverage for anyone, and she ducked and weaved without ever answering the question.  Bernie Sanders - refreshed and ready to move on after his heart attack - as honest about it, saying that taxes would have to go up.  The fact that few if any candidates went after Biden suggests that he's through.  Not so.  Biden is still leading in a few polls and he's well ahead in South Carolina, and he projected strength and resolve in light of Donald Trump's attack on him and his son Hunter in a press conference the day after the debate in Ohio.  Hunter Biden himself was impressive in his interview with ABC's Amy Robach.  Both Bidens have gone a long way toward addressing the involvement or lack thereof in Ukrainian business dealings, but of course there are too many second-guessing skeptics who will say that they're not satisfied.

Even as impeachment is gaining support in light of Trump's mismanagement of a misguided effort to knock Biden out of the 2020 presidential campaign to make Warren the Democratic presidential nominee and give her the full McGovern next November, Trump  has mangled the carefully crafted U.S. Middle East policy to the point where the Turks have turned the Kurdish enclave in Syria into the greatest pocket of misery west of Bangladesh, and the Islamic State terrorist prisoners held there are escaping.  It took House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, during a White House meeting on Syria, to stand up - literally! -  to Trump over the matter in full fury while her male counterparts in the room bowed their heads for the shame if being there (stop pussy-whipping yourselves, guys), after which Pelosi - whom Trump called a third-rate politician - and Senate Democratic leader Charles Schumer stormed out.  And yet Trump may survive all this despite bipartisan fury over his Syria policy simply because he supporters think a Kurd is something that cows chew.

Meanwhile, House Oversight Committee chairman Elijah Cummings just died.  RIP. :-(  This could be a blow for House Democrats trying to make a case against impeachment that can persuade at least a few Senate Republicans to vote for conviction in a Senate trial.  Yes, yes, the House Oversight Committee will have a new chairman - I don't know who that would be - but, at this juncture, saying that the House Oversight Committee could get another chairman seems like saying that Led Zeppelin could get another drummer after John Bonham died. :-(