Month: January 2018

I don’t know what Mueller knows, and he has vastly more experience in this field than I do, so I’m unlikely to second-guess his conclusions, whatever they may be.

Assuming, for purposes of argument, that Trump lets him finish his job, it appears to me that there are four possible outcomes of the investigation:

1.  He has Trump indicted.  This is very unlikely, as no previous special counsel has tried it, regardless of the strength of the evidence.  It is much more likely that the ultimate resolution of any findings of illegality will be left in the hands of Congress.

2.  He writes a one page letter saying there is insufficient evidence to support any charges against Trump.  The public will not be satisfied with this, so I doubt he’ll do it.

3.  He writes a detailed report explaining why, in his opinion, there is insufficient evidence to support any charges against Trump.  In all likelihood, there will be ammunition for both parties in this report.  Obviously, impeachment will not ensue.  The report, if anything, will help the GOP slightly in the election.

4.  He writes a detailed report explaining why, in his opinion, there is adequate evidence to support charges against Trump.  Democrats will cry for his impeachment, but the GOP won’t bite; the foundation has already been established for an argument that Mueller was biased.  The report becomes a huge campaign issue and helps the Democrats.

#3 and #4 are the most likely outcomes.  Neither will result in impeachment, but #4, under the right circumstances, could lead to Trump’s resignation.

We know from experience that there are two kinds of Trump speeches.  The first, “Faux Reagan,” attempts to uplift and unite the country.   These tend to be pretty boring, because he doesn’t have the ability to pull them off:  his words are cliches; he grimaces and scowls instead of smiling; and he inflects at the wrong time.  On a more positive note, however, at least he doesn’t offend anyone, and he talks about the country instead of himself.

The second, “American Fuhrer,” is weird, but compelling.  He paints a dystopian picture of an American rotting away, filled with drugs, violent criminals, and murderous illegal immigrants.  The outside world is filled with sharks, and we have no real friends except Israel.  He alone can fix these problems.

Last night’s speech was predominantly “Faux Reagan,” but there was some “American Fuhrer” thrown in about illegal immigrant crime and North Korea to keep the base happy.  I switched to an NBA game every time he started banging on about some hero in the audience.  Mostly, it was just dull and mildly annoying.

I’m sure his fans will say it was a triumph.

1.  In spite of achieving unprecedented heights of wokeness during the telecast, there were lots of complaints afterwards that women didn’t win enough awards and that Grammy voters and show producers alike pandered to the tastes of old white people instead of celebrating the work of cutting edge hip-hop artists.
2.  The ratings declined by 24 percent.

There is a lesson here for the Democrats in 2020.  If the primaries devolve into a long shriek about white male privilege, swing voters will choose Trump over a nominee who appears to despise them.

“Turning point.”  “Bipartisan.”  “Presidential.”  “New Trump.”  Those are the kinds of phrases you can expect to see in tomorrow’s headlines if, as expected, Trump reads his speech from a teleprompter and doesn’t talk about “American carnage.”

Don’t believe it–not for a minute.  We’ve seen enough to know what he is, and he isn’t going to change in any meaningful way.  And by the way, the bar for an acceptable speech should not be the ability to stand and read for an hour.

There has been a lot of chatter about David Frum’s new book in various national publications over the last few weeks.  The predominant opinion seems to be that the fears in the book are overstated, and that our checks and balances are working reasonably well.

Except now, the GOP House members who are supposed to be acting as a check on the executive are so determined not to perform that function, they have released a misleading document that endangers national security.  Of all of the revolting things that have happened over the last 12 months, this one has to be right at the top.  And where is the GOP leadership while this is happening?  Out to lunch, I’m afraid.

Just imagine what these people will do if we have a war or a major terrorist attack and Trump demands legislation curtailing the constitutional rights of his political opponents.  Do you think Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell will stand in his way?  Me, neither.

Send in the Trumpocrats–don’t bother, they’re here.

From the opening Kendrick Lamar number to U2’s performance in front of the Statue of Liberty to Kesha’s emotional orgy, last night’s Grammy’s reached levels of wokeness that have never been seen before at an awards program.  It made me positively dizzy.

The problem, of course, is that if you’re going to be that in your face, you had better have a great product to sell, and I didn’t hear it last night.  Instead, I found myself wondering how it would play out if Dr. Luke won Producer of the Year.

I would imagine that virtually everyone living in a red state changed the channel after about two minutes of Kendrick Lamar.  Since there are about fifteen televised country music awards programs throughout the year, that probably wasn’t a big deal for either the producers or the viewers.  I don’t think the Oscars will reach that level, however;  red people go to movies, too.

The Tonys, on the other hand. . .

Barack Obama didn’t swagger.  He killed people and blew stuff up because the job demanded it, but it didn’t seem to give him a lot of pleasure.  He treated his wife and two daughters with both affection and respect.  There were no allegations of sexual harassment that I know of during his administration.

Today, of course, the story is very different.  I was reminded of this when I saw a vehicle with a bumper sticker that said, in slightly saltier language, that we were now kicking rear ends, not kissing them.  This was viewed as a cause for celebration.  The swagger is back!  Manhood rules!

It has been said that Bill Clinton was the first black president.  If Obama doesn’t have that distinction, it seems only fair to call him the first female president.

Strengths:  bright and charismatic; background as prosecutor; gets to run in two lanes.

Weaknesses:  not really a national figure; use of illegal immigrants as a signature issue won’t appeal to much of the electorate.

Prognosis:  She could emerge as a fundi leader, and she could make a splash during the debates, but she won’t win.

Strengths:  executive and legislative experience; smooth, polished, and reasonable; can appeal to both white and minority voters.

Weaknesses:  may have some issues with fundis; comes across as Obama Lite.

Prognosis:  Obama Lite should look pretty good after four years of Trump.  He is a strong contender, even if Biden runs.

At this time last year, I thought we were headed for an agreement among the strong men–Trump, Assad, Erdogan, and Putin–that would permit Assad to remain in power, send the Iranians and Hezbollah home, and authorize the Turks to do whatever they needed to do with the Syrian Kurds.  This approach would, of course, have left our erstwhile allies in the lurch, but it had something important to offer everyone else, and a cynic might have welcomed it.

I guess I gave Trump too much credit for having a stable and coherent policy. Instead, we are in a situation where the Turks are bombing the Kurds in areas close to American troops.  The new plan appears to be to create an enclave of American allies in Syria under the pretense of continuing to fight IS and use it to extract concessions from Assad and the Russians in the peace negotiations. What it is really doing is driving a deeper wedge between us and the Turks, to Putin’s obvious delight.

Operating in the gray area between the Turks and the Kurds was always very difficult, but Obama managed to do it with some success.  Do you have faith in Trump to do the same?  Me, neither.

Strengths:  famous and respected name; reasonably successful Governor of New York.

Weaknesses:  lots of things in his record for fundis to criticize.

Prognosis:  If Biden doesn’t run, he could conceivably win by consolidating the vote in the white/realo lane.  If Biden runs, he’s toast.

Whether you like her or not, there is no arguing that Hillary Clinton is an historically significant figure.  How will her career be evaluated 50 years from now?

I think there will be two components to it.  First, it will be said that she was too far ahead of her time;  there were just too many Americans who couldn’t accept the idea of a female president in the early 21st century.  Second, she was unlucky. It is likely that she would have been elected in 2008 if the market crash had occurred six months earlier, and the MSM’s fixation with her bogus e-mail issue and Obama fatigue ultimately torpedoed her campaign in 2016.

It’s doubtful that Hillary would have been a great president, but she surely would have been competent, and that looks pretty good right now.

Strengths:  Vast executive and legislative experience at the highest level; Obama connection; compelling family story; experience with national campaigns; ability to appeal to swing voters, particularly white working men.

Weaknesses:  Age; occasional gaffe machine.

Prognosis:  It is hard to imagine anyone with better qualifications to be president than he has.  No one would notice his age and gaffe machine weaknesses when he’s standing next to Trump.  He’s the leader in the clubhouse if he decides to run.

All GOP politicians feed red meat to the Reactionary base to some degree, but Trump has taken it to a whole different level.  He just never stops.  Why?

Here are some reasons, which are not mutually exclusive:

1.  It’s fun.  There’s nothing more entertaining than triggering liberal outrage.

2.  He believes in rewarding loyalty.  After all, nobody sticks with him like his base, and loyalty means more to him than anything else.

3.  He doesn’t know what else to do.  He got elected by offending moderate opinion–why would he stop now?

4.  He knows he’s an implausible champion of the far right.  A thrice-married, flamboyant Manhattan developer and casino owner isn’t exactly an obvious mouthpiece for white rural Christian America, so he has to keep reminding them he’s on their side.

And so he continues on Twitter, regardless of the damage it is doing to the image of this country throughout the world.

Strengths:  already a national figure; very bright; strong grasp of policy details; acceptable to fundis; gets under Trump’s skin.

Weaknesses:  Stop me if you’ve heard this before–a smart, uncharismatic, middle-aged white woman running against Donald Trump.

Prognosis:  She only wins if the Democratic electorate decides that a virtual rematch of the 2016 election is a good idea, which it isn’t.