Cromwell

Ross Douthat gives us three theories of the Trump cabinet: a group of disrupters; a coalition of different ideologies; and a pack of talking heads. Is there merit to any of them?

Yes, but I would put it somewhat differently. Here is my take:

1. GOOD COP, BAD COP: Trump’s new foreign policy and Treasury teams come from the establishment, as they did last time. That doesn’t mean he’s giving up America First or the tariff and deportation scheme; it means he wants to disarm his critics, while keeping his options open. The essential functions of government will continue on two tracks–one traditional and bureaucratic, and one personal and idiosyncratic–just as they did during the first term.
2. RETRIBUTION: The jobs that involve inflicting pain on his enemies and the deep state went to complete loyalists.
3. COALITION OF DISRUPTERS: The jobs that aren’t important to Trump were allocated to supporters representing a wide range of views, most of them inconsistent with expert opinion.

It would appear that being good on TV was a consideration, too, but that was just a tiebreaker. The bottom line here is that Trump himself will be the disrupter on foreign policy and economic issues, and that the coalition of differing ideologies exists only in areas that don’t interest Trump much.

Furious opposition from the legislature, the media, and the public defeated the attempt by South Korea’s president to impose martial law. Since Trump is perfectly capable of trying the same thing, are there any lessons in this episode for him?

The message here is that liberal democracy will be defended vigorously by the citizenry. It is more likely, however, that Trump will conclude that the keys to maintaining control over widespread public opposition are the unconditional loyalty of the military and the willingness to use lethal force ruthlessly against large crowds of unarmed protesters.

Both Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski are Republicans with no sympathy for the MAGA movement. How are they different?

Murkowski represents a red state; her objections to Trump are intense and personal. Collins, on the other hand, comes from a blue state. Her brand, out of necessity, is independence. She can’t afford to be too close to Trump for fear of losing her seat.

John McCain was a hard libertarian conservative, but he retained enough independence to tank Trump’s effort to destroy Obamacare. Mitt Romney was the GOP nominee for president in 2012, but he voted to remove Trump from office on two occasions. We owe both of these men a debt of gratitude, but they are no longer in the Senate. Is there anyone left who can replace them?

Collins and Murkowski, for different reasons I will discuss in a future post, have little sympathy for MAGA, so Trump has always known he can’t rely on them. As to the others, the most promising candidates are McConnell and David McCormick, the new senator from Pennsylvania. The former, while a GOP partisan to the core, fundamentally disagrees with Trump on issues relating to the Constitution and foreign policy; the latter won by a microscopic margin in what is still a blue state, so his continuing political survival will depend on his ability to separate himself from Trump when the latter gets out of control.

Is it likely that the DOJ would have thrown so many resources into prosecuting a perpetrator of victimless crimes who wasn’t the president’s son? Not really. Based on his use of the pardon power in his first term and his law enforcement nominees to date, wasn’t Trump already determined to use the criminal justice system for his own political benefit? Clearly, yes.

There was, therefore, a plausible rationale for the Hunter pardon. It will, however, be a disaster for the nation and the Democratic Party, because Trump and the GOP will be throwing it in our faces whenever we complain about Trump’s efforts at authoritarian government. It will provide cover for actions that threaten liberal democracy.

And so, for the record, I need to say that, while I don’t think Hunter deserved a particularly harsh sentence, I don’t support the pardon. I believe it was a profoundly selfish act that will taint Biden’s legacy forever. It will have the negative impacts of Ford’s Nixon pardon (albeit on a smaller scale) without the nobility.

I guess Biden believes his party and his country owes him one for winning in 2020 and standing down in 2024. Is he right? You decide.

Matt Gaetz is a preening, self-important clown who would have spent more time spewing lies on Fox News than on “reforming” the DOJ. Pam Bondi is a fierce Trump loyalist who, as far as I know, has retained her sense of professional ethics. Kash Patel is something else entirely. He is a completely dedicated, totally ruthless, and possibly competent Trump acolyte. If confirmed, he won’t simply purge the FBI of the people responsible for the Russia investigation; he will turn federal law enforcement into a purely partisan process. He will give Trump’s friends effective legal immunity and manufacture cases against his opponents based on shaky legal theories and implausible evidence. He is the tip of the authoritarian spear.

Given his combative personality, I can’t imagine him denying much of this during his confirmation hearings. Will the Senate acquiesce? If it does, expect the jails to be full of prominent Trump opponents very quickly.

The increase in violent crime began on Trump’s watch and has largely subsided over the last two years, but you would never know it if you watch the news. Why? Because, as Don Henley once said, it’s interesting when people die. Crime stories dominate the local news and get plenty of attention on national broadcasts. Why wouldn’t people be afraid?

But Trump will do his best to persuade people that he alone has succeeded in getting crime under control. Will the national and local TV stations buy into this narrative, or will it be business as usual? I’m guessing the latter, but only time will tell.

As with inflation, the MSM bought into the GOP narrative on illegal immigrants in 2024. Day after day, we saw stories that focused on the hordes of asylum seekers crossing the border and their impacts on real Americans; the barbarities of Trump’s plans for raids and massive deportation camps received far less attention, since they were hypothetical at that stage. What can we expect once Trump is in office?

Three observations are pertinent here. First, the left-leaning MSM tend to focus on the problem of the day and miss the bigger picture, so I would expect them to run lots of poignant stories about the raids and the camps once they become a feature of everyday life. Second, the millions of Fox viewers will never see those stories and will be oblivious to them. Third, you can expect Trump to do his best to prevent the MSM from providing images of raids and the camps. I doubt he will have much success, but he is bound to try.

By any objective standard, the American economy was the envy of the world on the date of the election. The misery index was at a paltry six percent. The markets were riding high. Inflation had fallen almost to the Fed’s two percent target. Interest rates were coming down, and real wages were going up. And yet, Trump and the GOP prevailed on the basis that the economy was terrible. Why?

Part of it, of course, was lived experience with inflation prior to 2024. Part of it was the assumption on the part of poorly informed Americans that their pay increase was due purely to merit and rising prices to the failures of their government. But a big part of it was the result of the message one heard every night on the national news, and not just on Fox. The MSM constantly reminded us that inflation was out of control and did little to put that story into a larger narrative of worldwide supply chain problems, rising wages, and low unemployment. The public consequently responded by telling pollsters that their own finances were fine, but economic conditions as a whole were awful. Biden and Harris never found a way to deal with that attitude.

What will the MSM tell us about the Trump economy? Will they use today’s conditions as a baseline, or put on a parade of witnesses to tell us that things are so much better than they were in 2022, and Trump deserves the credit?

We’ll see.

When Trump plows through the guardrails, the issue will ultimately wind up at the Supreme Court. Thomas, Alito, and (probably) Gorsuch will support him, while the three liberals will oppose him. The outcome will be up to Barrett, Kavanaugh, and most importantly, the Chief Justice. Will Roberts stand up for the system, or will he, as I suggested in a previous post, twist himself into a pretzel in order to preserve the shell of judicial independence?

Roberts is a political animal, so I think the answer will depend largely on the polls. If Trump is popular, the Chief Justice will be strongly tempted to give him whatever he wants in order to avoid a constitutional conflict the Court might well lose. If not, the middle three will be more confrontational.

You can’t really discredit your opponents; they can only discredit themselves. With that in mind, what is the best way to deal with Trump?

He won the election by promising to bring back the economy of 2019. He is entitled to try. If he fails–and I have no doubt that he will, unless he gives up his tariff and deportation scheme–the blue team needs to point it out, day after day.

Peaceful demonstrations and litigation are the proper response when Trump crashes through the guardrails and threatens liberal democracy. For more day-to-day stuff, however, the polls and the markets will be the best remedy.

It’s Thanksgiving. What, exactly, do we have to be grateful for? That we don’t live in Gaza? That Helene and Milton ravaged our hometowns but spared us? That the Best Western offered us free showers when we didn’t have running water? That some of my favorite teams are doing well? That we still have two months until Trump takes over?

Well, there’s all of that. What I will try to focus on is the scale of the volunteer effort to help the NC mountain communities recover from a loss that was unimaginable just a few months ago. It has been genuinely inspiring.

You can probably find something, too. Happy Thanksgiving!

Deporting workers connected with the food industry will inevitably result in shortages and soaring food prices, particularly when combined with tariffs on products from Mexico. The public, which thinks it just voted for lower prices, will not be pleased. Could Trump avoid this problem simply by telling Stephen Miller very quietly to leave those workers alone and focus on urban areas?

I will be surprised if that doesn’t happen; after all, many of the capitalists in the food industry who will be crying for relief are his supporters. Don’t think that a more cynical approach to deportation will completely solve the problem, however. The fear of being imprisoned in a vast and squalid deportation camp will be enough to drive millions of migrants, including essential workers in agriculture and the meat processing industry, out of the country. Labor and food shortages will ensue; they just won’t be quite as dire as they might be with a more transparent and even-handed scheme.

The Israeli government has agreed to a cease-fire in Lebanon, but the war in Gaza continues to stumble on. Why the difference?

Several reasons. First of all, Hamas killed far more Israelis than Hezbollah, and in a more inflammatory way. Second, even the radical right understands that a complete and permanent victory over Hezbollah is not possible, given its ability to retreat out of the reach of the IDF, whereas Hamas is caged in Gaza. Third, the radical right wants to colonize Gaza but has no such aspirations for Lebanon. Finally, Bibi has no particular political vulnerability with regard to Lebanon, but he does with Gaza. He has every reason to postpone his day of reckoning for his failures with Hamas.

In other words, if you think this cease-fire means the imminent end of the war in Gaza, don’t hold your breath.

It appears that the filibuster is safe–at least, for now. That means any GOP attempt to eviscerate the safety net will have to be accomplished through reconciliation. The parameters of that process are largely defined by the Senate Parliamentarian.

Could you name her without doing a search on your computer? Probably not; I couldn’t, either. But she’s about to play a big role in our country’s history.