Cromwell

Given the legal peril that Trump currently faces, there is little reason to doubt that he will call for violence (probably in his usual facially equivocal way) if he loses in November. Under other circumstances, the planning for this event with friendly state and local officeholders and militia leaders would have already begun. The polls, however, predict a Trump victory. That will have retarded any kind of planning for an insurrection.

In the short run, therefore, the state of polling at the present time is actually a good thing for the nation. If Biden wins, however, the sense of outrage will be that much more intense. A spontaneous uprising is less likely to succeed than a meticulously planned one, but it might be more violent.

For years, thanks largely to the McConnell Project, it has felt like the Democrats were in office, but not in power. While the blue agenda was blocked by the judiciary and the lack of votes in the Senate, reactionaries have been running wild in the red states. Nothing could be done about it without changing the political system itself, which only Trump and his allies were willing to contemplate, and the president didn’t appear to be doing anything to fight back. It was demoralizing. That, even more than inflation or Gaza or the bad polls, was the source of the blue team blues.

SOTU will have changed that. It has given the blue team hope. The widening divisions between Biden and Bibi, which I predicted months ago, will help rally the base. Trump is starting to get more scrutiny, and his first trial starts in two weeks. Things are looking up.

Trump was TikTok’s biggest critic while in office, but he has just changed sides at a time when both Republicans and Democrats are moving forward to require the sale of the company. It remains to be seen whether he has the clout to tank this bipartisan legislation in the same manner as the border bill. What can we learn from this experience?

Being both a principled reactionary and a Trump ally can be a very difficult experience, because the man on golf cart has a mind like a gumball machine (I think that’s a Mitt Romney line); he changes his positions based, not on ideology, but on personal whims, self-interest, and the identity of the last person who talked to him. If you want to remain on his good side, you have to be willing to abandon your most cherished beliefs on a moment’s notice, while vehemently denying you are doing exactly that. Not everyone can pull that off–don’t you agree, Mr. Graham?

Viktor Orban made a pilgrimage to Mar-a-Lago on Friday to see the man on golf cart. According to Orban, Trump assured him that he would cut off aid to Ukraine, which obviously doesn’t come as any big surprise. But what else did they talk about? Did Orban give Trump a primer on how to impose an illiberal regime on blue America? In particular, did he give him some instructions on how to shut down the NYT, the WaPo, CNN, and all of the other left-leaning media?

As far as I know, Orban doesn’t own any hotels or casinos, and he doesn’t play golf, so what else would they talk about? Hungarian cuisine?

Donald Trump wants Biden to be impeached for two reasons: first, simply for revenge; and second, for false equivalence. It will permit him to argue on the campaign trail that Biden is in the same ethical boat as he is. Since Trump wants it, the base demands it, too. As we know, the base usually gets what it wants.

But a frivolous impeachment followed by a quick acquittal will only bring shame to the GOP, alienate swing voters, and further endanger the seats of GOP House members in Biden districts. That doesn’t make political sense.

How will the leadership square the circle? By talking vaguely about how the investigation is ongoing, and about how compelling the evidence is, without actually doing anything. It’s dishonest, sure, but it’s the GOP, so what do you expect?

On the Biden congressional speech.

It’s the center he’s trying to reach.

Just in case you forgot,

The Trump years weren’t so hot.

He’s the guy who said we should eat bleach.

Somehow, I don’t think that approach will work with the PM of the Jewish state.

The 17th century philosopher Blaise Pascal argued that the rational man believes in God out of self-interest and intellectual modesty; if an atheist is wrong about God’s existence, the consequences to him are terrifying, but if a believer is wrong, the consequences are negligible. It makes a certain amount of sense in a cynical way.

But apply that reasoning to a second Trump presidency. It is perfectly possible–even likely, given the vagaries of his personality–that Trump wouldn’t use his emergency powers and control of the military to suppress dissent and eliminate all of the checks and balances in our government. You cannot say that with absolute certainty, however. Is that a gamble you really want to take?

If any of my readers are on the fence about the election, please keep that in mind.

I didn’t watch the SOTU, because my wife bought tickets for a Dylan concert last night. I had never seen Dylan live before, but I knew what to expect; he wouldn’t play many of the hits, and they would be mostly unrecognizable in new arrangements. That’s exactly what happened. Virtually all of the show consisted of slow blues numbers that all sounded alike.

There was one exception. The highlight of the show was “Roll Over Beethoven.” Who would have guessed that?

As for the other guy in his age cohort, the commentators all agree that he was feisty, energetic, and competent. The extremists in the GOP were stupid enough to heckle him, which only makes him look better by comparison. This will give heart to everyone on the blue team who can see the election going down the drain before the campaign even starts.

Biden knows that Bibi’s political survival depends on his ability to prolong the war and stand up to international pressure. It is unlikely, therefore, that the president is foolish enough to believe that he can flip Bibi on any major issue relating to Gaza or the West Bank.

Biden’s real audience at this point is the Israeli public and Bibi’s potential successors–most notably, Benny Gantz. If the next Israeli government is open to working with a viable Palestinian political entity–without any elements of Hamas, of course–on a course to a two-state solution, it will have a much better chance of normalizing relations with the Saudis, and the American political vision will have been fulfilled.

In other words, this is a long game, not a short one. It’s the man behind the man behind the curtain who matters here.

Dr. Jill and the president are discussing campaign strategy at the White House.

JOE: Well, Super Tuesday is over, with no great surprises. It’s time to talk seriously about the general election campaign.

JILL: Not a moment too soon. We’re behind in the polls, and panic is starting to set in.

JOE: So, how would you suggest we run the campaign?

JILL: I have some ideas for commercials that will set the tone for it.

JOE: Let’s hear them!

JILL: The first one is entitled “Covid.” People have forgotten what it was like during 2020. We would have images of Trump telling people to eat bleach, downplaying the virus, and refusing to wear a mask interspersed with shots of screaming ambulances, unemployed workers, and exhausted nurses. That’s Trump’s America. We deserve better.

JOE: I like it. What else?

JILL: The second one is called “Dictators.” Trump is on camera saying great things about Xi, Putin, and Kim. Then we show him saying he will be a dictator on the first day. Why shouldn’t we believe him?

JOE: OK. Next?

JILL: “Witnesses.” Quotes from people like Bolton, Mattis, Barr, and Tillerson who worked for the man. You don’t have to take it from us; everyone who served him says he’s unfit for office.

JOE: Next?

JILL: “Ukraine.” Lots of images of destruction and death caused by Putin and the Russians. Trump wants to hand Ukraine to the invaders. Is that really what America wants?

JOE: Good Next?

JILL: “Abortion.” Shots of Trump taking credit for the end of Roe mixed with horror stories about women who were forced to give birth in extreme circumstances.

JOE: That one should resonate. Anything else?

JILL: Three more. “Tariffs” will focus on Trump’s desire to raise prices at the grocery store, “Climate Change” will mix images of hurricanes and wildfires with shots of Trump throwing paper towels to desperate people in Puerto Rico and saying climate change is a Chinese hoax, and “Health Care” will make it clear that Trump still wants to repeal Obamacare.

JOE: That sounds pretty powerful.

JILL: It better be. We’re rowing upstream against a current of Trump nostalgia. If we don’t overcome it, we’re going to lose, and God knows what happens after that.

JOE: Let’s get to work!

Elon Musk is a techno-optimist; Donald Trump is a reactionary who wants to bring back the economy of the past at the expense of the future. Musk is basically a self-made billionaire with plenty of real accomplishments; Trump inherited his money, squandered lots of it, and maintained a fortune only by becoming a celebrity. But Trump apparently met with Musk yesterday and asked for a large campaign contribution, which he might well get. What is it that brings these very different men together?

Two things: a belief that they are great men who should be above the law and popular opinion; and a contempt for bureaucrats and the status quo. My guess is that Musk cynically believes that power will devolve to him and his fellow tech bros once Trump has finished putting a jackhammer to the America we know and love. If so, he’s probably wrong.

It was obvious from the beginning that the most likely outcome was a unanimous, or close to unanimous, decision keeping Trump on the ballot. The concern about a patchwork of state decisions may or may not have been supported by the text of the Fourteenth Amendment and case law, but it definitely made sense from a practical perspective.

I don’t see much to complain about here. The decision to take jurisdiction of the immunity case is a completely different story. Even if the Court ultimately writes a ringing opinion rejecting the immunity argument, it has effectively, and deliberately, rigged the scales in favor of Trump.

Paul Krugman is right; there is a double standard in our political discourse. It is viewed as perfectly legitimate for rural residents to describe American cities as being crime-ridden, godless hellholes, but the same is not true for urban residents describing red America as socially and economically backward. Where did this distinction come from, and what does it mean?

Four observations are pertinent here. First, the urban/rural cultural and political split is not unique to American history, as anyone who has studied the English Civil War and the Paris Commune could tell you. Second, it has been a factor in American politics since Jefferson. Third, it is more virulent in America than in other countries, since they are more ethnically homogeneous than we are. Finally, the urban/rural political split has more practical ramifications in America than in other countries because the Senate gives disproportionate representation to rural residents.

Last time, the Europeans responded to Trump by sucking up to him. Will we see more of the same this time around, if he wins?

No. They know it doesn’t work. As soon as Trump flips on Ukraine and starts imposing tariffs, the gloves will be off. The EU will retaliate with tariffs of its own, and the downward spiral will begin.

It will be interesting to see how Viktor Orban, Trump’s ideological blood brother, enjoys losing the benefit of American markets and military assistance. The whole notion of an international grouping of fervently nationalist states makes no sense.