But the political bargain assumes that those with a monopoly on force are better than us. When it becomes clear that they are not, and that they will not follow the rules they enforce on the rest of us, people start to realize that there is no reason for the public to follow the rules either. You can only game the system for so long before there is no longer a system to game.
–Me
Rick Wilson famously said, “Anything Trump touches dies.” Unfortunately that may include the American republic.
Over the past year there have been initiatives in several states to disqualify Once And Future Viceroy for Russian North America Donald Trump from running for President, the most advanced of which was in Colorado. This idea is based on the 14th Amendment, which states in (ostensibly) clear language, Section 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.
District Court Judge Sarah Wallace ruled on the case this month, and said on one hand that Trump had clearly engaged in insurrection with his support of the January 6 riots, and yet also ruled that because the wording does not specifically bar a person from being President as opposed to Senator, Representative, or elector OF a President, that therefore Trump still gets to run in Colorado. Apparently “officer of the United States” doesn’t count. As several talking heads pointed out, this would mean that Nathan Bedford Forrest would be clearly barred from running for Senator but NOT President, such is the “logic” of this decision. Note, “Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability” is also the threshold required to convict an impeached officer in the Senate.
It would have been more consistent to either bar Trump from running on the grounds that he had committed insurrection OR ruled the matter in his favor on the grounds that his free speech did not in itself constitute insurrection. By ruling that he had in fact engaged in insurrection yet also ruling that, once again, the laws of this country do not apply to King Donnie, First of His Name, this judge pleased no one, including Trump’s team, who are making an appeal to a higher court along with the NeverTrump Republicans who filed the initial case. Now at least one of those talking heads also theorized that Judge Wallace was counting on exactly this, because her case that Trump engaged in insurrection was a “finding on fact” which is much harder to eliminate than her conclusion, which is a legal opinion. But still: Candy-ass. She knew how things were going to end up, she just didn’t want to be the one blamed by Trump’s mob of trogs.
There is nothing wrong with the US Constitution that cannot be or has not been reformed with the Amendment process. It contains everything it needs to enforce its provisions. But it still needs actual people to enforce them, and this is where America falls down. We are where we are because a Beer Belly Putsch tried to dispatch the core of the United States government, up to and including Trump’s own Vice President, and yet Putin’s Little Bitch Boy still gets to stink up the air with his mouth because a critical plurality of Americans think rule by “strong”man is a good idea. (Even if I agreed with those people, the problem is that Trump is neither strong nor a man.)
If it was a matter of the country going fascist because that is what a majority really wanted, that would of course be awful, but it isn’t even that simple. The last presidential election, not to mention all the midterm elections and special elections surrounding abortion prohibition, have all made it clear that the Trumpniks are not a majority in this country, yet they still have enough numbers to do real damage. Indeed, that is why they fight as viciously and maniacally as they do, because they know that despite all their protests to the contrary, Middle America is not on their side.
Not that it would matter if the rest of the country is against them if their chicanery works next time, because it doesn’t matter that not all the Palestinians are with Hamas, or that not all the Venezuelans support Maduro, or that Putin’s war of choice is increasingly unpopular. What matters at that point is that the thugs run the government and they will kill you for not obeying orders and being politically correct. Which is why we have to defend the republic while we still have it.
And yet that seems to be too much for some people.
As rump continues to get both more brutal and more stupid by the week – for instance threatening to prosecute Joe Biden even though supposedly Barack Obama is actually running things – President Joe Biden is also getting more unpopular by the week. One columnist dismissed Biden’s press secretary: “I would put the president’s stamina, the president’s wisdom, ability to get this done on behalf of the American people, against anyone,’ (Karine) Jean-Pierre said. ‘Anyone, on any day of the week.’
“Biden staffers can play make-believe all they want, but voters are smarter than that.”
When Trump won once and is now leading in the polls, saying “voters are smarter than that” immediately disqualifies your argument.
A huge part of the problem is a drop in support among the voters Biden needs most, young voters and people “of color.” A big part of that, apparently, is Biden’s approach towards Israel as it bombs the hell out of Gaza.
OK, so you’re mad because Biden is siding with the Israelis over the Palestinians. So, apparently the solution is to just hand the government back over to Trump, whose son-in-law handed the West Bank over to Israeli settlers. Gee, I’m glad that makes sense to you, cause it makes no sense to me AT ALL.
Lincoln was wrong. You may not be able to fool all of the people all of the time, but if you can fool enough of the people enough of the time, the rest of it doesn’t matter.
People like me didn’t vote for Hillary Clinton in 2016, and look what happened. Now little boy Trump feels entitled to power, and he’s gotten more spoiled, stupid and evil than ever. EVEN Hillary Clinton would have been a better choice than him. And Biden is a better choice than Hillary Clinton. If only by virtue of the fact that he’s not Hillary Clinton. I mean, until we got Trump Virus ™ I could almost understand people preferring the Trump economy to Biden’s, but after 2020, why would anyone in their right mind vote Trump? I mean, I would ask Herman Cain, but…
Fact is, Trump didn’t win the election in 2020 when he had all the advantages of incumbency, and it’s hard to see how he could win with all the liabilities he’s piled up since, and especially since there are fewer sympathizers in position to help him cheat. What he needs is another 2016 where he had just enough people in just enough states to either vote for him or not vote for the Democrat. And this is why Democrats are so hyper-sensitive about “spoilers.” But who exactly is going to do that? Right now the press seems to be focusing on a few candidates:
-Senator Joe Manchin, Democrat of West Virginia: He’s not running for re-election next year because West Virginia is the most Trumpnik state of the Union and it’s a miracle he’s held office as a Democrat this long. At the same time, Manchin has so much vanity and sense of entitlement – even by Senate standards – that he seriously acts like he has a mission to lead the country as President. This despite the fact that he can’t win his home state (and as Al Gore could tell you, that’s no way to win the Electoral College) and has no national following outside it, as opposed to-
Robert Kennedy Jr.: Who uses his family name and “progressive” reputation to foist policies that are the exact opposite of progressive. Like the time he said that the COVID virus was “targeted” for Whites and Blacks but not Chinese and Ashkenazi Jews. Now, wait, in his defense, if you’re Chinese and you’re going to spread a virus in America, who else is going to eat in Chinese restaurants?
Democrats are so scared that because he’s a Kennedy, Bobby is going to take Democrat votes away from Joe Biden, but he seems most likely to attract people like himself: aging ex-liberal Baby Boomers whose counterculture skepticism has curdled into paranoid conspiracy theory. In other words, the kind of people who weren’t going for Biden anyway, would have preferred Trump but might like another choice. Thus, he seems more likely to “spoil” things for Trump than Biden. Assuming he gets that far. In my opinion, Kennedy’s real problem is that his voice is completely shot, it’s hard to follow what he’s saying, and I don’t think most audiences would have the stamina to sit through one of his speeches, nor do I think that he would have the stamina to speak for very long.
And then you have the Greens, who don’t even have the name recognition of Jill Stein this time, and you have Dr. Cornel West, and I somehow doubt that the kind of people who would vote for Cornel West would want a result where Trump ends up winning the election.
And something tells me that all those “progressive” kids who aren’t going to vote for Joe Biden over Palestine are the same kids who weren’t a factor when they complained about Bernie Sanders losing the 2020 primaries, which he might not have if they’d voted for him then.
Face it, kids: We’re stuck. It’s either Joe Biden or Donnie Clownboy, and it’s a much easier choice than the media wants you to believe. I can understand why that’s not good enough for you. That’s why I voted “third” party for years. I mean, if you don’t want Joe, his designated successor is Kamala Harris. She ran against him the last time, and if that was good enough for liberals, she’d be at the head of the ticket and not him. And that’s all I need to say about that for now.
You want to do something about these lousy choices, we first need some better ones. There no longer is a center-right alternative to the duopoly, and again, the Greens are that much less a factor than the Libertarians. Even more important in the long run, we need to make the alternatives feasible. You’d first need the non-partisan runoff system like they have in California or the initiative they’re proposing for the 2024 ballot in Nevada to effectively make the primary round the first round of a runoff process.
It would mean changing the Electoral College to work like it already does in Maine and Nebraska, where Electors are apportioned by district and not winner-take-all. Yes, that would mean Republican districts in New York and California count for their candidate, which I’m sure is why Democrats will not change the Electoral College no matter how much they bitch about it. It would also mean that Democratic districts in Texas and Florida would count for their candidate, which they may not have considered. If you can shift enough of Texas to the Democrats, then the Republican Party will go the way of the Whig Party, only more archaic and with a smaller Anti-Slavery contingent.
But that’s going to be next year at the earliest, and only in some places. In the meantime you have the aforementioned problem: Republicans are getting increasingly belligerent and authoritarian at the same time as they get more unpopular (or perhaps vice versa) and thus neither they nor their Messiah will accept their reality. I mean, that would require listening to what voters want, which I guess defeats the purpose of being in government. As it stands, the 2024 campaign cycle will end in only one of two ways: Either Trump becomes God-Emperor or Trump goes to jail. Why not just cut to the chase?
It’s going to end up that way because the kind of party that would nominate a Trump is not going to listen to anyone else. The only way out of this is if enough Republicans see the light and nominate someone in their clown car to be the nominee instead of him. They’d still have lots of problems (as Trump would put it) but would be less likely to create a fascist regime. Based on the last eight years, I see little reason to think that would happen.