For years, political pros trying to suss out the national landscape kept their eyes on Virginia. With elections for governor and state legislators in the political off-years—those odd-numbered years between presidential and midterm congressional elections—the state has been seen as a bellwether for trends not yet revealed by national elections. In 2017, Democrats won the governor’s mansion and nearly took control of the House of Delegates. (A random drawing that decided a tied race gave Republicans a 51–49 majority.) And these Democratic gains were viewed as early signs of electoral resistance to Trump’s presidency and a foreshadowing of Democrats winning the House of Representatives the following year. In 2019, the state legislature did flip, and Democratic lawmakers went on a tear passing progressive measures, abolishing the death penalty, implementing voting rights reform, and boosting the minimum wage.

Virginia is certainly less of a swing state than it once was. With the political power of its Washington suburbs having grown, it’s been more reliably blue ever since it became part of Barack Obama’s electoral triumph in 2008. Still, the coming fall election is turning into something of a surrogate battle pitting Trump and Trumpism against reality-based Democrats.

Terry McAuliffe, the onetime wheeling-and-dealing businessman and Clinton fundraiser who served as Virginia governor from 2014 to 2018, won the Democratic gubernatorial nomination last month. His Republican rival in November is Glenn Youngkin, a private equity mogul who was CEO of the Carlyle Group. This past week, two key political players signaled they would do whatever they can to make this race a referendum on Trump: McAuliffe and Trump.

McAuliffe’s campaign released an ad handcuffing Youngkin to Trump. In the spot, the GOP businessman declares that he was “honored” to receive Trump’s endorsement and states that Trump “represents so much of why I’m running.” It then features Trump calling the coronavirus pandemic a “hoax” and notes 600,000-plus Americans have died in the pandemic. There’s video of Trump insisting, “We want to terminate health care,” and calling the white supremacists who marched in Charlottesville “very fine people.” The tagline: “Don’t let Glenn Youngkin do to Virginia what Donald Trump did to America.”

After bagging the nomination, Youngkin, who praised Trump during the GOP primary race and played along with the Big Lie, has strived in recent weeks to pivot away from him, going so far as to acknowledge that Biden is the president. (Fancy that!) As Mark Rozell, dean of the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University, observes, recently “Youngkin has sounded a lot more like a traditional Republican than a Trump acolyte.” It’s the traditional Republican strategy: Flirt with the extremists during the primary, then seduce the center. In fact, Youngkin was recently caught on video privately saying that he wouldn’t reveal his anti-abortion plans until after the election, out of fear of alienating independent voters.

But Youngkin’s attempt to (slightly) distance himself from Trump is being complicated by none other than...Trump himself. On the same day McAuliffe put out that Youngkin-equals-Trump ad, Trump released a lengthy statement reiterating his support for Youngkin. “Glenn has been an incredible success and will truly Make Virginia Great Again,” he proclaimed in an email sent out by his political action committee. “Rarely have I seen such enthusiasm. Virginia has so much potential but has been badly hurt by awful economic policy, terrible crime, and the worst education system promoting Critical Race Theory, etc. But, Glenn will fix this immediately. He is a highly respected person, not just a figurehead like Virginia’s current and recent past Governors. Terry McAuliffe was a failed and unpopular Governor, whose only claim to fame was his relationship with Crooked Hillary Clinton—how did that work out?”

And as he so often does, Trump made it personal: “I knew McAuliffe well. He accepted large campaign contributions from me, said only great things and would do whatever I wanted, until I ran for office. He was a political HACK! If Virginia wants to open up and take advantage of its great and virtually unprecedented opportunity, Glenn Youngkin is the very successful businessman that will get them there!”

Trump wants the Virginia contest to be a face-off between McAuliffe and Trump. This is part of his endless quest for revenge and his obsessive crusade against Hillary Clinton. (At the Conservative Political Action Conference held this past weekend in Dallas, Trump blathered on about her, and the red-meat-chewing crowd responded with the predictable chant of lock-you-know-who-up.) Though the Virginia results are unlikely to affect Trump’s overall cultlike hold on the GOP—it seems nothing can weaken that—he ought to be careful what he wishes for. If this race does become defined as a Trump-McAuliffe clash, a McAuliffe win could reinforce the message that Trump has little political power outside the most Trumpian environs, such as the conservative movement, Foxworld, and the Republican caucuses in the House and Senate. At the least, it would give McAuliffe bragging rights. And he will surely use them.

Sidenote: I’ve had plenty of run-ins with McAuliffe, first when he was a major fundraiser for the Clintons in the 1990s and then when he was chair of the Democratic National Committee in the early 2000s. At the 2000 Democratic convention, I was hosting a radio show on-site at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, and during one episode McAuliffe passed by. A producer grabbed him, and he graciously jumped on live. We wrestled over the role of big money in American politics. He held firm to his stance that the hundreds of millions of dollars he had raised and poured into the system had no corrupting influence. Nor had there been anything improper about his assorted business ventures that appeared connected to his political financing. He was jovial and completely unashamed of his prodigious buck-raising talents. “Gotta run,” he said at one point. “See you later, my friend.” And off he trotted into the convention crowd.

Flash forward: It’s a few weeks after the November 2013 election that landed McAuliffe in the governor’s office. I’m at a reception in Washington. He enters, and a small crowd rushes over to congratulate him. He finishes with them, and as he works the room, he bounces up to me and, flashing a mile-wide smile, asks, “Can you believe it?” I reply, “Yeah, Governor McAuliffe.” He responds, “Yeah, Governor McAuliffe.” He lets loose a joyous laugh, as if he had just told a joke: “Can you believe it? Can you?” He is delighted and surprised. What a long way he had come from serving as a modern-day bag man to governing the 12th-largest state.

Would You Drop Half a Mill on a Hunter Biden Painting?

Hunter Biden is a lawyer, the author of a memoir, and not a professional artist. But he is now trying to make millions selling his paintings. In most instances, there’s nothing wrong with a celebrity artist attempting to cash in on his or her fame to score in the art world. Consider Leonard Nimoy or George W. Bush. (Bush is donating a portion of the proceeds from his new collection of paintings celebrating immigrants to organizations that resettle immigrants—though he won’t say how much.) But in this instance, Joe Biden’s son is creating an ethics headache for the White House. How is it possible for a person or corporation to pay between $75,000 and $500,000 to an artist who happens to be the president’s son for work that wouldn’t fetch a fraction of that without the 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue tie-in? That’s how much Georges Bergès, his gallerist, is asking for an original Hunter Biden piece. (Hunter favors working with ink.) It’s an all-too-easy way to pass large amounts of cash to the president’s son and win favor with the Bidens. The corruption potential is as vivid as Van Gogh’s palette.

The White House has cooked up a system for addressing this possible conflict of interest. Bergès will sell the paintings and keep secret all the information about the purchase, including the identity of the buyers. And he won’t sell to foreign officials or suspicious parties. (Sorry, Mr. Russian Oligarch, no Hunter Biden original for you!) But the system is flawed. The purchaser certainly can tell the world—or somehow let the right people know—that he or she has dumped hundreds of thousands of dollars into Hunter’s bank account. And any purchase—blind or not—raises the value of Hunter’s work.

As for the value of Hunter’s strokes, I asked Pulitzer Prize–winning art critic Jerry Saltz what its fair market value might be. He reminded me that in the art world there is no such thing. Art is worth whatever someone will pay for it—for whatever the reason. Saltz explained:

Hunter Biden’s work is meh. Very pretty. Derivative. Sort of driftwood sculpture of watercolor art. The prices being paid for his work are like people paying ridiculous prices for paintings by Red Skelton or Sylvester Stallone. It is “fan art.” Star art. All art prices are 100 percent subjective. All. If people are stupid enough to pay those prices for this crapstraction, then fine. Really, you could say the same about an all-white painting that I love by Robert Ryman.

By the way, Robert Ryman, a jazz musician before he was an artist, is a fascinating figure. Read this appreciation of him.

Back to Hunter. Sure, he deserves to live his own life. The White House is not wrong to insist he has a right to pursue a career. It’s not his fault his pops is the commander in chief (in spite of the real and bogus controversies Hunter’s activities sparked). But having previously made a bundle in Ukraine and China, likely because of his family connection, perhaps he can do the starving-but-not-starving-artist thing for a few years. Then, once his dad is ex-president, Hunter can see how much his paintings are worth. In the meantime, as he looks to deploy his painting skills in a meaningful way, Hunter can turn to his stepmom for an example. He can be an art teacher.

What to Read, Watch, and Listen To

Michael Mechanic, How the Super-Rich Really Live—and How Their Wealth Harms Us All. The “very rich... are different from you and me,” F. Scott Fitzgerald once observed. “Yes, they have more money,” Hemingway quipped years later. (The story is a little more complicated than that.) And in his new book, Michael Mechanic, a colleague of mine at Mother Jones, says the top .01 percent are different and, then again, they’re not. Either way, they are still distinguished by possessing a helluva lot more money. Mechanic spent years exploring the world of the super-wealthy. He’s a bit like the host of a National Geographic special or Robin Leach from the 1990s Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous, chronicling the well-off in their natural habitats: the luxury car dealership, the wealth management office, the ultra-lovely home, the personal security company. On this fascinating journey, he discovers they are not happier than the rest of us; some even suffer from “wealth anxiety.” Poor guys.

Mechanic offers much more than voyeurism—the vacations! the mansions!—he deftly shows the many ways the system is rigged in their favor so that wealth perpetuates greater wealth. (Make sure you buy your yacht in international waters to avoid taxes!) He digs into the history of the wealthy pulling strings. When John D. Rockefeller was trying to obtain special legislation to set up a foundation to shield his wealth from taxes, Teddy Roosevelt remarked, “No amount of charities in spending such fortunes can compensate in any way for the misconduct in acquiring them.” Perhaps. But Rockefeller got his foundation.

Mechanic documents how the huge income gap in the United States affects the social fabric. He cites an economist who points out that one of the most notable aspects of the US economy is not its innovation and rampant wealth creation but the fact that more than 165 million Americans live with little income, a declining life expectancy, and tremendous stress about surviving. “Half of the population of the richest country on the planet ‘is not prospering,’” Mechanic writes. He further observes, “Our strike-it-rich aspirations might be harmless if not for one inconvenient truth: The wealth fantasy, combined with the peculiarly American notion that anyone can succeed via grit and smarts and hard work, leads us not only to tolerate mind-blowing economic unfairness, but to support the kinds of policies that produced this mess in the first place.” (Hope Richard Branson enjoyed his recent trip to almost-space.) It was dirty work scrutinizing the challenges, foibles, and injurious actions of the rich. But we should all be glad Mechanic took on this task, and at least he got to cruise in some very fine rides.

Got any feedback on the above or recommendations of what I should be reading, watching, or listening to? Send them to thisland@motherjones.com.

Read Previous Issues of This Land

July 10, 2021: Why the Republicans are right to be terrified of the new House committee investigating the 1/6 attack; Dumbass Comment of the Week; Joni Mitchell’s Blue 50; and more.

July 7, 2021: How The Summer of Soul counters the GOP’s season of hate; a debate on the recent UFO report; Garry Trudeau, American Dostoyevsky; MoxieCam™; and more.

July 3, 2021: Donald Rumsfeld, Christopher Hitchens, the Iraq War, and me; the perils of taking a home DNA test; Dumbass Comment of the Week; a Springsteen story; and more.

July 1, 2021: Ivanka Trump, Donald Trump Jr., and perjury; Adam Serwer’s new book; Cézanne’s crime scene; and more.

June 29, 2021: How the new UFO report is bad news for UFO believers; my own UFO tale; HBO Max’s Hacks; an anti-racist anthem; and more.

June 26, 2021: Is Josh Hawley dumb or evil? (The answer is not both); Dumbassery that encourages mass “executions” in the United States; renowned guitarist and songwriter Richard Thompson’s new tour and new book (and his claim regarding the best strings arrangement ever on a popular song); MoxieCam™ (before and after photos!), and more.

June 24, 2021: How an alleged 1/6 conspirator who called for executing Trump’s foes hooked up with a prominent Republican Party official; new Los Lobos; and more.

June 22, 2021: Why the GOP is pushing “political apartheid”; Ted Cruz wins Dumbass Comment of the Week; recommendations for an Apple TV+ series and a book on the curious origins of the universe; the first Clash tour of the United States (and being trapped in a van driven by a punk on acid); MoxieCam™; and more.

Got suggestions, comments, complaints, tips related to any of the above, or anything else? Email me at thisland@motherjones.com.