The First Scalp

Michael Flynn is a paranoid conspiracy nut who should never have been National Security Adviser.  It is a categorically, objectively good thing that he is gone.

The question that now hangs over the White House is a famous one: What did the President know, and when did he know it?  Josh Marshall and the Washington Post both suggest that the White House has known for weeks about Flynn's lying about his contact with Russia and the extent of those ties.

The question becomes one of incompetence versus evil.

Is the Trump Administration so chaotic and poorly run that they can't be bothered with allegations that their freaking National Security Adviser might be a Russian mole?  Or did they know, but thought that it was cool?

Either answer to that question is disturbing as hell.

My guess is incompetence, but I'm basing that primarily on the bizarre scene at Mar-A-Lago where the President's national security team was reading classified documents in an open dining room, using unsecured cell phones as flashlights.  However, given Trump's open fascination and closeness with Putin, I can't rule out evil.  We also know that Trump has the attention span of a beagle on meth and can't be bothered to learn anything that can't be retweeted.  So perhaps he was simply under Flynn's thrall.

Again, all answers are disturbing as hell.

What's more, is that these allegations probably have very little resonance outside the Acela corridor and the Deep State, permanent national security apparatus.  The yokels and rubes who elected this shitgibbon are just waiting for America to be great again by kicking out the Messicans and putting agitators in their place.  Oh, and the resurgence of coal and manufacturing jobs.

Meanwhile, Democrats need to keep making this about Republicans, because they are enabling Cheeto Benito and abandoning their commitment to the country and the Constitution.

This Could Be Important

I've worried about the Democratic base talking too much to itself.  Here is a paragraph from the National Journal that reinforces my fears.

A sign of the dif­fi­cult times Demo­crats face: One of their top poll­sters, who re­ques­ted an­onym­ity to speak can­didly, lamen­ted that most of the is­sues that the Demo­crat­ic base is ex­er­cised about have little ap­peal to voters who voted for Obama and then flipped to Trump. “Noth­ing he’s do­ing is de­priving people who voted for him. He’s simply check­ing off the boxes of cam­paign prom­ises,” the poll­ster said, cit­ing the pres­id­ent’s travel ban and anti-free-trade pos­ture. He dis­missed the fury over Edu­ca­tion Sec­ret­ary Betsy De­Vos’s nom­in­a­tion as a product of the clout of teach­ers’ uni­ons, doubt­ing it would res­on­ate with the broad­er pub­lic. Ac­cord­ing to the poll­ster, the only is­sues that have the po­ten­tial to res­on­ate with per­suad­able voters are: de­fund­ing Planned Par­ent­hood and po­ten­tially Obama­care, if Re­pub­lic­ans roll it back in a way that would cause people to lose health cov­er­age.

The poll­ster’s frus­tra­tion is en­dem­ic with­in the Demo­crat­ic Party’s pro­fes­sion­al class. So far, the party is hop­ing that tweak­ing its mes­sage could help woo back Obama voters. But the Demo­crat­ic base’s cul­tur­al dis­con­nect from these oth­er­wise-win­nable voters is mak­ing that re­build­ing pro­cess all the more dif­fi­cult. As I’ve ar­gued in this column, the party’s more lo­gic­al path back to power runs through win­ning GOP-lean­ing sub­urb­an voters dis­af­fected with Trump. But the base’s no-holds-barred op­pos­i­tion to everything Re­pub­lic­ans do is mak­ing that op­tion more dif­fi­cult.

Here is the disconnect created by the Big Sort.  The extraordinary energy of the anti-Trump movement is a great thing to behold.  But to what degree is it changing suburban Republican voters to Democratic voters?  I think they are convincing them to vote against Trump in 2020, but the Democrats need to win the House in 2018.  This would give them subpoena power over the Trump Administration.

If they don't create a wave that delivers some suburban districts, they have lost a tremendous opportunity.

Sadly, the best opportunity for Democratic gains would entail the following:

A complete repeal of Obamacare.

A "border tax" on Mexican goods.

Combine those things, and you will destroy the lives of many Trump voters.  And many non-Trump voters.  In doing so, you will create the wave that you need to oust the GOP from power.

The cost, however, could be very, very high.

Out Like Flynn

There is recently some suggestion that Michael Flynn might be on his way out of Der Gropenfuhrer's national security team.  Flynn apparently had contact with Russian officials during the transition.  Since Trump's coziness with Russia is a concern even to otherwise supine GOP Senators, Flynn represents a real weak point.  You have the national security establishment withholding information from the president because they "assumed that the Kremlin has ears inside SITROOM."  Of course, they also are withholding information because they assume Trump doesn't listen to them anyway.

Most administrations would jettison Flynn with a catapult strong enough for him to reach low orbit.  But Trump isn't most administrations.  He is obsessed with "winning" as a sole metric for governance.  Throwing Flynn overboard would be "losing."  He can't allow that to happen.

This leaves us with a national security adviser who is not trusted by the national security apparatus.  These are the days we live in.

Maybe if they can get Kate McKinnon to play him on Saturday Night Live, Trump will finally fire him.

One Thing We Can Agree On

Trump has made SNL great again.

And Kate McKinnon is amazing.

Utah

Holy crap.

Your average GOP congresscritter understands a basic calculus: He or she (ok, he) has more to fear from a primary challenge on the right than from a general election foe.  This would be doubly true for someone like Chaffetz.

But what if their calculus is wrong? In 1994, the presence of a Democrat in the White House made a lot of conservative Southerners decide that having a Democratic Representative was no longer as appealing.  Could Trump make moderate voters - including some Republican and Republican-leaning suburban professionals - swing hard to the Democrats in 2018?

The thing is, 9/11 pretty much drove the GOP insane.  That was when the ethno-nationalists and mouth-breathing John Birchers became ascendant.  Fed on a steady diet of Fox News, they divorced from reality.  But Obama, and to a much lesser degree Dubya, held the crazy in check.

Now the crazy is on full display.  And the presumably non-crazy Republicans are marching in the parade down crazy street.

The key will be for Democrats to make sure they run 435 strong House candidates and 34 strong Senate candidates and however many strong gubernatorial candidates and - while we're at it - thousands of good state house candidates.

The Trump Shit Show is not going to get better.  Make it an anchor around the GOP's neck.

The New Normal

Life in Trumpistan.

I'm sure Jefferson Beauregard Sessions will be all over this....

And Still She Persisted

It's difficult to think of a bigger unforced error than McConnell shutting down Elizabeth Warren.  Coretta Scott King's letter still made it into the record and he's created a hashtag, a meme and a rallying cry.  All the while, he's drawing attention to the basic sexism and racism at the heart of the GOP's governing coalition.

To Make Welcome For Glorious Nation Of Trumpistan

I mean, holy shit, he just doesn't care.

I'm Not Usually An Alarmist, But....

Here we have Senate Republicans shutting up Elizabeth Warren for reading the words of Coretta Scott King.  And here we have Der Gropenfuhrer threatening to destroy a state legislator in Texas.

There is no doubt that Trump is A) a narcissistic paranoid with delusions of grandeur and B) already prone to authoritarianism and C) surrounded by crypto-fascists and neo-Nazis.  The worry has always been that Republicans would roll over for Trump's egregious violations of American political norms for the sake of enjoying the power that comes with controlling three branches of government.

These are examples of that in action.  Not only have they excused Trump's excesses, but they are beginning to internalize that sort of behavior themselves.

This won't end well.

Nevertheless, she persisted....

Trump-Splainer

Here it is. 

Gutted

I've been spending the long weekend with my Dad as he recovers from major surgery. Hence the light blogging. Anyway, if anything can put the Falcons' fourth quarter shitshow in perspective, it's sitting with your 79 year old dad as he recovers from having a massive tumor removed from his guts.  I'll take watching the game with him over winning the game without him.

Incommunicado

Somewhat reduced blogging, as my Internet is limited. Interesting argument about things like "The Bowling Green Massacre."  Is mockery the best tactic against authoritarianism?  I would say yes, in the case of Trump, but no in the case of Steve Bannon. I'm not usually impressed with "scalp hunting", but getting rid of Bannon should be goal #1. Then humiliate The Donald until he quits.

Clueless

Read this article in the WaPo and tell me that Republicans have any freaking idea what they are doing.  A few of them realize that screwing tens of millions of Americans out of health care is pretty big deal.  But so many of the rest are living in an alternative facts world where ACA is a disaster, that they can't see the immense benefits the reform has brought.  ACA is bad because it's bad, so it has to be repealed.

They are being consumed by their own rhetoric.

Another good example of this is the latest diktat from Cheeto Benito.  Deregulate Wall Street?  What could happen?

Clearly, this is an opening to those vaunted WWC voters who pay close attention to the intricacies of governmental policy and use their franchise wisely to reward and punish politicians who look out for their interests.

How Soon Before The Shooting Starts?

So every day is another WTF moment in American history, thanks to Cheeto Benito.  Yesterday alone we had three incidents that would normally be a crisis.

1) Trump insults and attacks the Australian Prime Minister and then shits all over him on Twitter.

2) Trump may have threatened to invade Mexico, though Mexico denies this.

3) The military felt like they needed to throw the White House under the bus for the weekend's botched raid in Yemen.

Leaving aside the fact that Trump apparently didn't know that Frederick Douglass is dead, those three stories ALONE contain more scandal than three years of the Obama administration.

Trump's attack on PM Turnbull is 100 times more vehement, insulting and damaging than anything Obama did with Netanyahu.  As much as Obama hated Netanyahu and as much as Bibi involved himself in American politics in a way that should have outraged everyone, their relationship over 8 years never got as bad as Trump's with Turnbull in a 30 minute phone call.  The linked article notes that Turnbull is weak on his right flank, and this could topple his government.  Presidents don't do this.

An invasion of Mexico to root out cartels would presumably fall under the president's war powers.  Congress would be very unlikely to check him on this, though perhaps Democrats will try.  If we combine this with the Yemen story, I think we can see a situation where Trump launches an attack on cartels sites in Mexico because why the fuck wouldn't he.  Then, we learn of dead civilians, dead soldiers and we have a full blown international crisis - not just with Mexico but with all of Latin America.

Meanwhile, today we can expect a ratcheting up of tensions with Iran.

We will be at war with someone soon.  It is frankly inevitable.  Trump is basically governing like 9/11 just happened, because in the right wing hive-mind, it is always 9/12.  But I don't think anyone outside the 101st Pantwetting Brigade is all that jived up to go to another bullshit war.

Trump was elected as a chaos agent.  He was elected to destroy the institutions of government.

He's right on schedule.

To Filibuster Or Not

With the nomination of Gorsuch to the Supreme Court, the question is now whether the Democrats should filibuster the nomination, as was done to Merrick Garland, and force McConnell to nuke the filibuster.

There are two arguments against it, one of which makes no sense.  The argument that they need to save the filibuster for the next nominee - should a liberal justice die or retire - is simply nonsense.  Because if they do filibuster that hypothetical nominee, McConnell will simply nuke the filibuster then.  I suppose you could hope to pick up three Senate seats in 2018, but if so, simply stop the nominee with a majority vote.

The second involves rules and norms.  Republicans won the White House - and what's more - they won the Senate.  This is the cost.  There are more Americans who would like a Democrats president and Congress, but we don't live in the right areas.  So the Republicans won, and they get to pick the Justice.  Of course, the Republicans broke all sorts of rules and norms by denying Garland his seat.

The question becomes: Should the Democrats continue to erode the rules and norms of governance?  They would certainly be justified in doing so, given how Republicans have acted over the last eight years.  But the Democrats are the party of responsible governance.  Violating those norms would undercut their position as the Responsible Party.

However, that leads to the second question: Does anyone care which party is responsible?

Doesn't seem that way.

UPDATE: Certainly the GOP doesn't care about the rules.