Shit Is Getting Real

If you want to read the most cogent and insightful analysis of the ongoing Russian influence scandal, just read Martin Longman.  He makes - and has been making for weeks - the argument that the intelligence "community" has basically launched a slow motion coup against Trump.  He describes this as both terrifying and necessary.  Quite a few other authors have noted that the "Russian might blackmail Flynn" story is ridiculous, because blackmail only works if the two parties involved share a secret.  Once Flynn's involvement got to the White House, there was no blackmail.

What there was instead was a lack of response from Trump.  This gibes with current reporting that the Trump team was in close contact with Russia prior to the election.  And, now we know, after the election.  Some of this reporting about Paul Manafort and Carter Page was known, in fact they both resigned under a cloud of suspicion.

Needless to say, the rank incompetence of the Trump team stands in sharp contrast to the actions of the Deep State security apparatus who are really good at this.  Therefore, if there is more and more damaging information to come, it will continue to come at regular intervals.

For instance, I can see a circumstance where the NSA or CIA has information about that shady Rosneft stock sale.  There are rumors that Trump has been given major stock holdings in the Russian oil company.  That's how you start.  You launch some rumors.  Let the Trump team deny them.  Then you drop a story over a couple of days that slowly erodes the White House's credibility.  That's how they took down Flynn.  If this theory is right, it could also extend to Trump.  Again, I don't think the Deep State will take down Trump out of spite or because he's an idiot, baby-handed manchild with the intellectual capacity of a tired four year old.  They will do it, because they think he is compromised and a threat to national security.

Obviously, this is not the way we are supposed to handle these things.  If Trump is truly compromised, and circumstantial evidence continues to mount around him, then ideally the Congress would exercise its prerogatives as a co-equal branch of government and investigate the President, perhaps leading to his impeachment and removal from office.  The GOP Congress has shown almost no desire to do their oversight job. There are a few exceptions like Bob Corker, but I think we can hold of re-writing Profiles in Courage until we see actual hearings.  If they happen, they will almost certainly happen in the Senate, as the House is full of craven halfwits and cynical partisans.

As Ed Burmilla writes(and he wrote this about the Pee Pee Memo), Congress doesn't like this guy anyway.  The smarter ones have taken a "wait and see" attitude, but that is starting to wear thin.  If - as I suspect - there are more and more leaks coming, if we are about to see Trump's financial connections to Russia, then we could see them abandoning Trump en masse, as President Dense becomes a perfectly palatable option.

Seriously.

If we are in the midst of a well-orchestrated coup by the Deep State against Trump, he might not last until Memorial Day.