P.M. Carpenter
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P.M. Carpenter
Commentary on political and international affairs
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Final Day of This Plea."Bastards. Simply beasts." And he's proud of it"Absolute evil"A Ukrainian gift for Putin on his 70th birthday'Jaw, jaw is better than war, war' - but not for Iran's leaders The funniest headline you'll see all weekThe Saudis' direct slap in the face of Presidents Biden and XiA visual overview of Ukraine's recent advancesThe right and AristotleArchives
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October 09, 2022
Final Day of This Plea.
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"Bastards. Simply beasts."
And on it goes. Month after month. Ukrainian civilians detained, tortured, murdered. Civilians in a free, democratic society rendered a living hell of oppression under Russian occupiers.
My hope would be that U.S. intelligence has shown this video and others like it — videos even worse — to national security adviser Jake Sullivan, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and President Joe Biden.
I use the conditional. Had these gentlemen been shown such videos, I can't see how they could continue denying Ukraine every kind of weaponry it has requested from the U.S. — weaponry that could obliterate many of the beastly bastards and hurl the others back to the collapsing motherland.
I understand realpolitik. I get it. But this is real barbarity carried out on a massive scale by the superior firepower and undeveloped conscience of the forces of Vladimir Putin. Either it's answered by the superior conscience and firepower of the West, or history will show that this was our beastly hour, too.
And he's proud of it
You know the biggest crowd I have ever seen? January 6. And you never hear that. It was the biggest. And they were there largely to protest a corrupt and rigged and stolen election… It was the biggest crowd, I believe, I have ever spoken to.
— Rermarks from his rally at the Minden-Tahoe Airport, 8 October
Reports The Nevada Independent: "The majority of his remarks disregarded Nevada entirely."
No surprise there. Instead he railed as he always rails — do his ralliers never tire of the same old spiel? — "For six straight years, the witch hunts, hoaxes and abuses have been coming at us fast and furious. We have a weaponized Department of Justice and FBI on everything. including of the courts. I mean think of this, how about, including the break-in of my home, concerning the so-called document hoax case."
For Trump and his primate following, "the so-called document case" is an appellation akin to "many people say," some with tears in their eyes.
This, however, is the really proud part in the Independent's reporting:
"Since Trump’s endorsement of [Nevada's gubernatorial candidate Joe] Lombardo in April, Lombardo" — who was at last night's rally — "has, at times, kept a distance from the former president. In an October debate against [Gov. Steve] Sisolak, Lombardo, asked if Trump was a 'great' president, said: 'I wouldn’t say great. I think he was a sound president.'
"But soon after the debate, Lombardo’s campaign issued a press release stating, 'By all measures … Trump was a great President.'"
And so it goes, for the so-called Invertebrate Party.
"Absolute evil"
On the last day of September, Vladimir Putin, in a pretext for yet more civilian slaughter in Ukraine, said in a national address that "the United States, together with the British, turned Dresden, Hamburg, Cologne and many other German cities into ruins." He omitted that Nazi Germany had previously unleashed a massive campaign of aerial bombing over England, killing 40,000 civilians.
Putin's implicit threat, like so many of his threats, whether implicit or explicit, is again making good on his justification for targeting yet more Ukrainian civilians, having already tortured and massacred thousands.
Immediately after the military sabotage of Russia's only supply line from the mainland — the Kerch Strait Bridge — Putin let loose a battery of missiles on the city of Zaporizhzhia, once the home of more than 700,000 Ukrainians and still the home of Europe's largest nuclear power plant. (Photo: Reuters.) Zaporizhzhia has also served as a major humanitarian center for Ukrainian refugees from other areas of Russia's genocidal campaign.
The missile strike hit roughly 45 residences; 17 deaths confirmed, although the body count is sure to rise. Thursday, Putin's forces struck another residential section of Zaporizhzhia, killing 14 others.
The twist to this horror story is that Putin is bombing what he considers a part of Russia, Zaporizhzhia being one of the four provinces he illegally annexed. In late September a Russian strike also hit a convoy of cars and buses carrying Ukrainians out of Zaporizhzhia, killing at least 30, including women and children.
Such is the grimness on the ground. Moving on to the less tangible, the latest bombing was a piece of Russian hard-liners' fury at the motherland's steady loss of, particularly, lands that Putin just acquired with the stroke of a pen. The Kerch Strait Bridge's destruction seems to have ignited the same but more intense criticisms of Russian military leaders.
The hard-liners haven't yet denounced Putin's military bumbling in Ukraine. But then again, they'd be unlikely to do so; they would instead remove him, possibly in a rather rude way. For now, reports The NY Times, their "frustration" over "the calamitous explosion" on the bridge has confined itself to "calling yet again for Russia to escalate its attacks on Ukraine" — and by that, they mean attacks on Ukrainian noncombatants.
Deploying a bit of reverse psychology, one war correspondent praised Ukraine's victorious "consistency" as "enviable." Turning darker, he demanded that Russia "hammer Ukraine into the 18th century, without meaningless reflection on how this will affect the civilian population."
Wrote another war correspondent, "The enemy has stopped being afraid, and this circumstance needs to be corrected promptly." Russia's Telegram "commentary" channel — read: propaganda outlet — Rybar, posed a question: "If this is not a reason for really decisive measures, then what is it?" Really decisive measures is, of course, a euphemistic phrase for a nuclear explosion — somehow, somewhere.
Following Thursday's attack on Zaporizhzhia, Russian forces launched a second attack on the same area, displaying the classic terrorist tactic of killing first responders and civilians rushing to help. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky pronounced this "Absolute evil" — and such evil, one should add, is never "banal." The Ukrainian military has also noted Russia's use of Iranian-made "kamikaze" drones to strike Zaporizhzhia.
Against this, Ukraine is deprived of enhanced military assistance, such as U.S.-made longer-range rockets. The Biden administration fears their delivery might "further provoke" Putin, as one American correspondent put it. "Proportionality of response" is a key concept in proxy-warring retaliation — even against absolute evil. And yet the White House has dismissed the concept-in-action following every further provocation by the Russian tyrant. If the U.S. were to embrace it instead, Ukraine could likely end this war by early 2023.
October 08, 2022
A Ukrainian gift for Putin on his 70th birthday
Russia has one bridge linking the motherland with Crimea. And Ukraine just blew it up.
The fireball rising from the 12-mile Kerch Strait Bridge, on Crimea's easternmost side, is believed to be the work of the Ukrainian military or perhaps partisan sabotage. The level of confidence perfusing that belief is extraordinarily high, in part because a Russian state news agency denied any Ukrainian involvement, claiming instead that a fuel tank had caught fire, with no damage done.
Casting further doubt on the news agency's claim, especially that of no damage, is that The NY Times reports that "at least" one section of the bridge tumbled into the waters between the Black and Azov seas. The greatest damage done, however, was the disruption of Russia's only supply line emerging from the mainland, providing essential war material — fuel, weapons, ammunition — to its troops fighting in southern Ukraine.
Ukraine is being coy. A senior military official said: "All I can say is that an echelon with fuel intended to supply occupation forces in the south of Ukraine was passing over the bridge from Krasnodar Krai," a federal part of Russia in the North Caucasus region, just north of Georgia.
Added the official, "Putin should be happy. Not everyone gets such an expensive present on their birthday."
This long-range view shows the immensity of Ukraine's gift.
Inside the fireball.
Putin personally commemorated the bridge's opening in 2018, four years after he violated international law by seizing Crimea.
Said Zelensky adviser Mikhailo Podolyak in August: "It is an illegal construction and the main gateway for supplying the Russian army in Crimea. These kind of objects must be destroyed.”
Another military official would neither deny nor confirm Ukraine's responsibility for the beautiful bombing. Also over the summer, reports the Times, "the Ukrainian military posted a taunting image on Twitter threatening to strike the bridge with American-provided guided rockets."
On my car's radio a couple days ago I heard an NPR reporter say that President Biden decided to withhold longer-range rocket systems from Ukraine because he wanted not to further provoke Putin. I've lost count of the Russian butcher's provocations and escalations, but one matter is consistently knowable: President Zelensky can honestly and honorably say that Ukraine is always plenty happy to provoke Vladimir Putin.
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Just spotted on Twitter:
Another video of the explosion on the Crimean Bridge. https://t.co/k9queHw3Lm pic.twitter.com/WMe1B6Av9H
— Rob Lee (@RALee85) October 8, 2022
'Jaw, jaw is better than war, war' - but not for Iran's leaders
Since the revolution of 1979, Iran's leaders have expertly denounced the United States as the chief villain behind its domestic unrest. The Middle East Eye observed in May of this year that Iran's GDP is about a third of what it was 10 years ago, the Atlantic Council reported in September that its inflation rate was "at least" 60%, Al-Monitor wrote in July that Iranian social media is "filled with updates on the prices of rice, dairy, bread and other essential items," and the World Bank notes that Iran's "inadequate targeting of [social] benefits" is attributable to their disconnection from the grisly inflation rate — all of which, said the Wilson Center last year, has left Iranian families with "income inequality, unemployment, and increasing poverty."
There's no doubt about Iran's economic calamity being caused in large part by U.S. and European sanctions, although the leadership's gross mismanagement of the economy has doubled down on the chaos and deprivation. As the Brookings Institution records, President Obama's nuclear accord with Iran lifted much of Iran's misery — but then came the ignorant, incompetent Donald Trump, reviving it. Rejoining the accord with President Biden would benefit Iran enormously, however therein lies another but. It ain't happenin'.
Thus Iran finds itself in (sorry) unprecedented domestic upheavals, with protesters denouncing the regime as the regime has denounced the U.S. What is a thoughtless, repressive, unholy theocratic regime to do in such a mess? Conjure a national distraction, of course. And that, reports the Institute for the Study of War, is precisely what Iranian leaders are now doing.
The site's lede: "Iran may attack the US, Israeli, and/or Saudi targets in retaliation for the role Iranian officials claim those countries have played in stoking the ongoing, anti-regime protests." Far be it from anyone to deny that the CIA or Mossad or the Saudis' General Intelligence Directorate may have a hand in Iran's domestic storms, but this one is on its leaders. They've been present at the creation of this acute, Islamic Republic implosion for nearly a half-century. No regime can oppress, starve and virtuously bully its citizenry while swamping itself in corruption, fomenting international turmoil and so remarkably bungling its economy.
The ISW reports that its assessment of a possible attack "is based on rhetoric from Iranian military leaders on October 6." The warring chieftains are open about their rhetoric — because that's the whole point; alerting the public to the foreign machinations causing all of Iran's troubles. "Senior Iranian military officers released a statement accusing the US, Israel, and Saudi Arabia of coopting and stoking the protests and vowed to retaliate," continues the ISW. "The content and nature of the statement suggests that the heads of each major military and security body approved its release."
Speculation is that the regime will use its proxy militias "in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, and Yemen to attack US forces and US regional partners." In their statement the chieftains "reaffirmed the armed forces’ allegiance" to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who's in such poor health, he may not outlive the protests. Following his death, the scramble for power will be a ghastly sight, one assumes.
The military also reaffirmed that any tolerance of the protesters is out of the question. It condemned them as "seditionists" and swore to crush them. The protesters, however, have been unfazed by the regime's threats and bloody actions. The ISW further reports that the latest anti-regime protests took place in "at least nine cities in five provinces" and "smaller-scale demonstrations [occurred] throughout the country." More protests were encouraged by university faculty.
What's giving the demonstrations so much oxygen is mass political discontent at unequaled levels, but also economic grievances extending throughout Iran's socioeconomic classes. The latter, especially, cannot be fixed overnight and the citizenry will entertain more promises for tomorrow only with yesterday's disbelief. Thus the regime's demagogic trick is to distract the public with international violence.
Which will accomplish nothing but more economic distress — and more protests, rising in counterviolence. Repressive regimes just never learn.
The funniest headline you'll see all week
As this post's title says, there is this hilarity from The Washington Post:
"Arizona GOP raised record money with misleading pitches on election audit"
This is news? Only heaven knows what possessed the Post's headline editor to conceive this bit of Duh, but at any rate it mocks Josh Dawsey's Post bio, which says he's an "investigations reporter." Dawsey co-wrote the piece with Yvonne Wingett Sanchez, who covers Arizona politics.
The story's text is explained sufficiently in the headline, particularly so since we've been reading of deceptive Republican fundraising tactics for years, capped by Donald Trump's inexhaustible grift. Same with Kelli Ward, chairwoman of Arizona's Republican Party, which showered supporters with emailed solicitations for funding a state audit of the 2020 presidential election.
"Pitch in to Help Us Finish America’s Audit!" and "Help America’s Audit," wrote the party. Ward, meanwhile, acknowledged in a text to similarly decadent Republicans back in Washington that "We have not been raising money to pay for the audit." She also acknowledged that "We were expressly told that we could/should not raise money for the audit and auditors before the audit began." Nevertheless, she advised the national party's leaders that the state party would "keep the pressure" on for an audit. No complaints.
Nor did the party afterward use the more than a million dollars raised for the audit — for the audit. "The text message suggests that Arizona GOP leaders had no intention of using donations to help pay for the audit effort," write the Post's reporters.
The party's appeals were all perfectly sordid and classically Trumpian. But just as Trump exploited the GOP's creeping neofascism rather than pioneering it, the financing corruption and wanton duplicity of today's Republican Party reach back several decades.
Sen. Barry Goldwater cleared the path for the party's moralistic depravities in the late 1950s and 1960s. It was the New Right of the 1970s, however, that set the party on its permanent road to perverseness. The highest gods of creation were the right-wing activists Terry Dolan (right) and Charlie Black, whose 1975 innovation was the National Conservative Political Action Committee.
Freed by the U.S. Supreme Court from rational campaign finance laws — see: the Buckley decision, which axed statutory limits on independent campaign contributions and allowed PACs to raise and spend unlimited amounts of money — the twosome set out with NCPAC to defame liberal politicians through direct mail and television, radio and newspapers ads. The money that rained down on liberal pols was faceless, nameless and essentially blameless, since voters had no real idea whence all the money came and who was spending it.
The New Right and NCPAC's chief victims in their early days — the 1980 elections — were Democratic Sens. George McGovern (S.D.), Birch Bayh (Ind.) and Frank Church (Ida.). Each was swamped by NCPAC's shifting of mysterious money around in wildly dishonest campaigns conducted by equally faceless in-state groups, and since no human faces were attached to the outlandish claims made, each was stymied in his counterattacks — and each lost.
Moreover, NCPAC was the first to put an end to "all politics is local"; henceforth, all Republican campaigns were national.
And it was all backed by big money from little suckers. Kelli Ward and Donald Trump? As armed robber and kidnapper Alvin Karpis said of Bonnie and Clyde, They were just a couple of kids having some fun.
The Saudis' direct slap in the face of Presidents Biden and Xi
OPEC Plus, co-chaired by Russia and Saudi Arabia, has displayed a shocking level of international enmity and diplomatic incompetence. The Saudis' Crown Prince is emulating Vladimir Putin's ghastly decision-making in his relations with the world.
Last month, communist China, the globe's sharpest capitalist, warned OPEC+ that oil is too important to the planet's economy to be subjected to arbitrary price controls. "Oil is a global commodity, ensuring global energy supply security is vitally important," said Mao Ning, China's foreign ministry spokeswoman on Wednesday.
Yet Saudi Arabia's leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, has collaborated with Russia — photo, Reuters; the prince and Putin's energy minister — to rebuff China even though he has sought to realign with Russia and China in a rejection of his "junior partnership" with the United States.
The Global Times, China's political mouthpiece, reported only that "OPEC and its allies' decision is a 'slap in the face' for Biden." But the slap also caught a piece of President Xi's face, so China will be burned economically as much as the U.S, Europe, and other non-OPEC nations.
The Saudi prince's still-questionably profitable and diplomatically blundering move comes shortly after the U.S. approved yet another arms sale to Saudi Arabia. This was the Saudi's double betrayal of its historically grounded partnership with America. As PBS NewHour reported in September, the Biden administration approved a $3 billion sale of Patriot missiles to Saudi Arabia in August, just one month after Biden's visit with the journalist-butchering prince.
The NY Times: "The quiet understanding emerging from [the president's] trip was that Saudi Arabia would increase its production by about 750,000 barrels a day [in addition to the UAE's 500,000] ... pushing down gas prices and worsening President Vladimir V. Putin’s ability to fund [his] war."
But the prince's promise was "fleeting," noted the Times somewhat charitably. Saudi Arabia bumped up production in July and August, and then simply walked away from the deal. This is hindsight and therefore rather pointless, but President Biden would have been better off had he adhered to candidate Biden's description of Saudi Arabia as a "pariah" — one altogether unworthy of any U.S. arms sales. He gambled, and he lost.
As I quoted here Wednesday, the Saudis' energy minister said OPEC+'s decision to cut production was "technical, and not political." To this I added,, "No one is that naïve." Cinzia Bianco of the European Council on Foreign Relations, for one, agrees, saying "It is definitely political. It has nothing to do with money." Rather, the Saudis were "disappointed" by the U.S.'s virtual grant of $3 billion in an arms sale.
At OPEC Plus's news conference, the Saudi energy minister pushed back on the obvious: that his country had colluded with Russia. He said OPEC+ is but a "band of brothers" concerned only with market stability. I wrote above that the Saudi-Russian oil-production cut is "questionably" profitable, since many OPEC members have steadily failed in their production quotas because of investment shortfalls — hence one analyst told The NY Times that the actual production cut could come in at only around one million barrels a day — and if a world recession hits, the demand for oil will lessen along with its price.
Still, atop price increases merely from anticipation of OPEC+'s cuts, the price of Brent crude, the international benchmark, jumped another 1.5% immediately after yesterday's announcement. And of course multinational oil firms have just as quickly enjoyed more windfall profits well before the price at the pump reflected price realities.
Of all the journalistic assessments of OPEC's backstabbing, there is none better than that of the Times' David Sanger and Ben Hubbard: "For Mr. Biden, with midterm elections only a month away, the timing could not be worse."
October 07, 2022
A visual overview of Ukraine's recent advances
Rather than describing Ukraine's reclamations in words, done here so often, I thought a few visuals from Ukrainian forces' most recent advances would be helpful.
The first map, from the Institute for the Study of War and the American Enterprise Institute's Critical Threats Project, is of the southern front.
This front, commonly labeled as the Kherson region, obviously shows significant Ukrainian gains, some in only the last few days. But from the map it might appear as though Ukrainian troops are still quite some distance from the city of Kherson. This following, larger overview belies the illusion. In fact Mykolaiv is only 60 miles from Kherson, and Zelensky's forces have advanced more than half that.
This map of the eastern front, the Donbas, comprising the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces, is even more striking. Until recently Russia essentially held all of Luhansk's territory. With Ukraine's capture of the cities of Izium and Lyman to the northwest — important logistics centers for Putin's invaders — Ukraine cut the Russians' supply lines which further allowed its troops to advance well into Luhansk.
If you have not been following the territorial gains and losses in this war, as Americans did on large maps in their living rooms during WW II, I trust this brief overview will help to visualize just what in literal hell is going on in Ukraine, on the ground.
The right and Aristotle
I can only assume that if federal prosecutors move forward on indicting Hunter Biden, the right-wing Twitter addicts and beer-bellied BBQing toxic males will never acknowledge that President Biden, as he has promised, never interfered with the Justice Department.
What the right will shriek instead is that even Merrick Garland could no longer ignore Hunter Biden's awful, breathtaking, never-before-committed hairraising crimes, despite President Biden's vigorous pleadings and desperate interventions.
But that, we all assume that.
Because the right never changes. The only thing that has changed is that there is no more a far right. The whole of the right is now so far far right, the two have melded into a phantasmagoria of outlandishly nitwitted "rightness."
No longer can we distinguish the wackos from traditional Republicans because, as Aristotelian logic would have it: 1. All Trumpers are fascistically daffy. 2. Republicans are Trumpers. 3. Therefore, Republicans are fascistically daffy.
Only Bertrand Russell once attempted to defeat Aristotle's logic, and his effort was based only on highly technical linguistic grounds. I'll stick with the old Greek's formula. Plato's student was a well-known, solidly thoughtful anti-Trumper.
Herschel Walker, Donald Trump, and anybody's guess
In 30 seconds flat, Georgia's Republican lieutenant governor, Geoff Duncan, explains the peril of extremists' preponderance in primary races, the breakdown of party control in candidate selection, and the maleficent influence and overbearing contamination of Donald Trump.
Duncan: We didn’t ask who was the best leader. We didn’t ask who had the best resume. Unfortunately, Republicans looked around to see who Trump supported and he was a famous football player and so he became our nominee and now we’re paying the price pic.twitter.com/ddaISLpyZ1
— Acyn (@Acyn) October 7, 2022
In The Tilt, the NY Times' section on all things political, Nate Cohn writes that the one question he gets most frequently from readers is, "Will this matter?" — the this in this case being Herschel Walker's positively dazzling hypocrisy. Cohn isn't sure, noting that only one poll — by Insider Advantage, rated "B" — has been conducted since the "allegations" scattered themselves everywhere in the airwaves and print. The poll showed Democrat Raphael Warnock leading Walker by 3 points, although the poll's margin of error is 4, which also happens to be FiveThirtyEight's polling average.
Cohn nonetheless answers "'yes' — or at least a version of 'yes'" this will matter, which is a sly, ubiquitous tactic among election analysts to avoid being nailed down. This analyst's answer is "no." So not entirely ubiquitous.
The Times' sort-of prognosticator, like any good prosecutor, leads with the reasons why "no" is a reasonable position. Retaking the Senate is vital to Republicans, so they're "unlikely to throw him overboard"; Walker has "already incurred most of the potential reputational damage before this allegation"; and the kicker, which only the contemporary GOP could pull off: "The voters likeliest to find paying for abortion to be deeply repugnant are also likeliest to be solidly Republican," thus Walker gets a pass.
On Cohn's "yes" side are that Georgia has become an electoral squeaker, so even a one-point shift to Warner could secure his reelection; a possible runoff — a victory in Georgia requires 50% of the vote —would push Walker's bad press a few weeks back (barring yet more scandals); and a runoff would reemphasize to Republican voters the criticality of regaining control of the Senate.
You will note that two of Cohn's three reasons for a provisional "yes" are based solely on the possibility of a runoff. Hence on Election Day, there will be three reasons why "this" won't matter, against only one reason why it will.
None of this is to predict the election's outcome; it's just an attempt to answer whether Herschel's, ahem, mischief will matter. On whether Mr. Walker will join the "great deliberative body" of the United States Senate, I haven't a clue.
"Come on, Man"
Speaking of humor so early this Friday morning, how's this?
Fetterman, Oz, and Disney
Fetterman has tweeted a new ad, captioned: "Before there was Dr. Oz, there was Dr. Nick. They say the Simpsons always predict the future – and once again, they nailed it."
A reader and contributor forwarded the ad to me along with a short piece from the website, "Cartoon Brew." The site's reporter(?) notes:
"One can’t help but wonder about the legality of using the scenes from The Simpsons in such a way. Sources close to the situation have said that Fetterman didn’t reach out to Disney to ask to use the character. So, why hasn’t Disney had the video taken down? The video was posted more than 20 hours ago (at time of writing) and Youtube strikes have certainly been issued much faster and for less in the past. And what rights to artists have to refuse the use of their creations by politicians?...
"If, however, this type of use is protected and legal fair use, might we see similar strategies used in the future? Will Spongebob and the Minions start promoting political causes without authorization from their IP owners?"
I can only assume Disney hasn't objected to Fetterman's use of its copyrighted material because it dislikes "Dr." Oz as much as most folks.
Or perhaps Disney just sees the ad as the most honest of all political pitches.
October 06, 2022
The vicissitudes of polling and the joy of dart-throwing
The headline of a SurveyUSA poll released yesterday: "GA: Warnock 12 Points Atop Walker in Data Collected Largely Before Bombshell Allegations Walker Paid for Abortion."
SurveyUSA's polling is rated "A" by FiveThirtyEight. Again, that's before the abortion allegations — or rather, the fact — as well as condemnations of Herschel Walker by Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, challenger Stacey Abrams and Walker's own son.
Yet FivethirtyEight's polling average — a conglomeration of all respectable polling in the site's assessments — is a mere 4-point lead by Warner after the bombshell Walker allegations.
The statistical conflict throws into question political polling elsewhere, which to me is less disappointing than it is intriguing. Writes 538's "senior elections analyst," Nathaniel Rakich:
"Pennsylvania was supposed to be the Democrats’ insurance policy. The state’s Senate seat is currently held by a Republican, but Democratic Lt. Gov. John Fetterman has comfortably led the race since August....
"But according to three recent polls, Fetterman’s lead is narrowing. According to Suffolk University – B+ — Fetterman led by 9 percentage points in June, but a Sept. 27-30 poll gave him a 6-point lead. According to Fox News — A — Fetterman led by 11 points in July but by just 4 points in a Sept. 22-26 poll. And according to Emerson College — A- — Fetterman was up 5 points in August but just 2 points in a Sept. 23-26 poll. As a result of these and other polls, Fetterman has gone from an 11-point lead in FiveThirtyEight's polling average on Sept. 13 to a 7-point lead today."
No word from SurveyUSA on Fetterman. It would sure be nice to hear from them, though. Seeing how Survey exceeded 538's Warnock-Walker average 3x over, it might have Fetterman leading by 21 points in Pennsylvania.
Another Borowitz keeper
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