by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
I’m reluctant to give too much weight to anecdotal evidence that supports my personal political agenda. Confirmation bias is a real problem in The Age Of Trump. But no one really reads this blog in real terms, so I’ll indulge myself a minor flight of fancy.
Let me set the scene — I was getting wasted at this “secret” bar near my current abode when I found myself talking to a Judge Jeanine Pirro devotee. She was hard core. She was a little older than me but she was definitely the type of person Maggie Haberman would fall over herself to talk to– a middle-aged female Trump supporter. In fact, I said that to her. I made it very clear that there were people at The New York Times who would just love, love, love to talk to her about why she continued to support Trump.
Anyway, things went well — for a while. Once we established that NO ONE was above the law, things quickly went haywire. She wanted to talk about “Crooked Hillary.” Once I agreed with her that I thought that in 2016 the case could be made that Clinton could have been indicted things quickly went haywire. She would not admit that if I agreed to Clinton falling under the rule of law that Trump, too, had to fall under the same rules.
She just could not process the truth bombs I began to drop on her. The moment I mentioned “Individual #1” she started to shut down. Once it dawned on her that I had a rhetorical counter attack for each of her talking points she just locked up.
Soon enough, she bounced. She just left the bar.
And, so, I would say THAT is the source of the current Republican panic we see in Washington. While I generally believe the Republican Party is a criminal and fascistic organization at its core, when the common folk who support Trump don’t have a ready answer to criticism of Trump that’s a pretty big problem.
I have no doubt that Republicans are willing to ultimately defend the absolutely indefensible. They are completely unmoored from the norms of liberal democracy. “Democracy” exists only as a means to an end — that being more power for them. They are ready to ride the MAGA pony down to a Singularity of corruption, abuse of power and tyranny. In the end it won’t be politics that fells Trump, it will be Trump himself.
I still think Trump’s going to mentally explode. We’re going to have an actual mad man president for a few weeks, maybe more as we sort the situation out.
In other words, whatever your worst case scenario is at this point, that’s pretty much what’s going to happen. Buckle up.
