Category: Cold Civil War

Impeachment & The Politics Of (No) Shame

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Trump’s still not taking the impeachment drive against him seriously. I know this because we’re rushing through the Stormy Daniels playbook at lightning speed and he doesn’t seem all that concerned.

It’s when we come to the end of this playbook and he still faces impeachment that things are going to go haywire. One, Trump while criminally incompetent at his job, is in trouble in the first place in large part because he’s figured out how to use the levers of power to do his bidding. So, the moment he actually feels there’s an existential threat, he’s likely to do concrete, serious things in an attempt to end the march towards actually impeaching him.

Starting a war seems like the most obvious thing he would do. A war with Iran seems rather teed up for him, but for one thing — it’s my impression Iran is Russian client state. So, that would make things a little bit more complicate. Trump wants a major regional war for two reasons. One, it makes him a war president, which gives him more power. Two, he wants to wag the dog and the ability to use Lee Greenwood at any of his upcoming Nuremberg Rallies. Third, it gives the base a talking point — you can’t impeach the president, we’re at war! They get the own the moment at the Thanksgiving dinner table.

While Iran is still an option, there is a far more serious, far darker possibility –the DPRK. Trump barely believes anyone but Ivanka and himself really exist, so Trump could very well use an excuse of some sort to dramatically ratchet up tensions with the DPRK. Trump’s both stupid enough and completely devoid of empathy enough to actually start a jaw-dropping war with the DPRK in an effort to — in his mind — make it politically impossible for impeachment to proceed.

Now, the reason why this is even an issue is Trump and, by extension the Republican Party, is completely devoid of shame. They don’t believe in liberal democracy and they crave power for power’s sake like a vampire craves fresh blood. Add to this that Republicans are prepared to take the Trump Train to whatever destination it may go, and, well, you have a receipt for disaster.

In my view, at least, that means if Trump’s sole goal is to stay in power, he is going to “win.” In the highly unlikely event that his polls numbers crater into the teens, he isn’t going anywhere. His strategy remains the same — getting the base to turn out in Nov. 2020 and to use that as the Sword of Damocles over the heads of elected Republican politicians.

As such, from Trump’s point of view, as long as he can still appointed young hack judges and set policy, it honestly doesn’t matter how low his poll ratings are. That’s it, he wins. And, if need be, he can always depend on Russians hacking the election or simply bribing individual Electors to throw the election for him. That doesn’t even begin to address his pardon power.

So, really, the Republican Party and its cult will win the day because they have no shame and their goal is power for power’s sake. There honestly isn’t anything we can do. I’m glad we seem to be on the path to impeachment, but even if Trump’s crimes are extremely clear cut, Senate Republicans will never convict him. Sometime around Feb., Trump’s acquitted and even though his poll numbers are now about 20%, he will go about his merry way as if nothing happened.

When you have no shame and only care about power, that’s how things are going to shake out.

Having said all that, there’s kind of a dramatic and frightening ray of hope to all of this — Trump himself. Anyone who would call up the Ukrainian president the day after Bob Mueller’s “poor optics” testimony gave him a political pardon, is a pretty adept self-own artist.

So, while in theory Trump is likely to not only escape conviction but get a second term criminally, in practice he’s also likely to finally lose his mind. The pressure of impeachment is likely going to make him finally snap.

And, as such, in the end, it won’t be politics it will be Trump’s own mind that might end The Thousand Year Trump. While his Republican enablers will simply say Trump’s “joking” at first, even braindead Republicans might blanch at having to explain Trump tweeting out a dick pic. They’ll do it, of course, and it won’t really matter because they have no shame. But there’s a least a chance that after a few months of Trump acting in a fashion that is demonstrably and egregiously indefensible (far more so than anything he’s already done) the ground may shift under Trump and The Pence Pivot will take place.

Don’t hold your breath, though. Sometimes you have to articulate things just to make yourself feel better.

We’re Looking At Impeachment All Wrong

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I hate to break it to you, folks, but if impeachment really does reach a tipping point we’ve entered the darkest timeline. It won’t be impeachment, it will be Trump’s reaction to it that we’ll be talking about.

Trump has long had some sort of chronic mental problem. The stress of simply an impeachment investigation — which would likely take months — would, in it self, potentially cause him to decompensate. It’s would make a lot of sense if Trump found himself in something of a logic trap. He would absolutely feel as though he would survive an Senate vote. But he would also absolutely feel paranoid that he might not.

So he goes bonkers.

I therefore propose that in the end, it won’t even be impeachment that is Trump’s downfall — it will be his reaction to it. If Trump finally goes off the deep end, some astonishing surreal thing will happen. The first will be MAGA Stalwarts will find themselves defending ever-more demonstrably indefensible things on Trump’s part. First they will simply say he was “joking.” But there will come a point when they take the final plunge into their own destruction. Trump will tweet out a dick pic. Trump will begin to tweet out the N-word to Obama. And they will defend it, thinking that Trump, like always, will stay in control of the narrative.

And so, in the end, Trump’s tendency to self-own will get so absolutely bad that there might be an intervention, of sorts. They might propose to Trump that he gets to choose Pence’s replacement as veep. And maybe a promise of a full pardon after Pence wins re-election in 2020. Trump accepting such an offer would be the best case scenario for Republicans.

The worse case scenario is he won’t accept it. And in the end, Trump so far gone mentally that the Senate finally does, in fact, convict him not so much because of any particular crime, but for the complete failure of the 25th Amendment to work.

And then, I’m afraid, we have a once-in-generation event. Young people won’t reference 9/11, they’ll reference Trump’s downfall. It will probably play out a lot like the OJ’s slow motion police chase in a white Bronco. It will last days, even weeks. The entire country will grind to a halt as we attempt to lure Trump out of The White House.

It will be a dark day in our history.

Here is how it may play out. I wrote this some time ago, but the premise is the same.

9/10ths
a story fragment of a possible near future
by Shelton Bumgarner

April, 2019

The eyes of the world were on the White House.

Just moments before, President Donald J. Trump, 45th president of the United States, had been convicted by 67 members of the Senate for a whole list of high crimes and misdemeanors. Trump had for weeks now been ranting on Gab about his case in the Senate, bouncing back and forth between threats to start a war with Iran or the DPRK and not-so-subtle hints that he might take his own life should he be convicted by the Senate.

And, now, at last, the moment of truth had arrived.

Trump legally, at least, was no longer president, but he had been oddly silent since the verdict had been announced with great fanfare from the well of the Senate. Trump’s conviction had come after months of investigations on the part of the now Democratic Congress. The length and breath of Trump’s malfeasance discovered by these hearings had rocked the nation to its very core. On more than one occasion, MAGA talking heads on cable news had been interrupted by astonishing breaking news that left them, for once, unable or unwilling to defend the president.

The hearings had ground on for months to such an extent that Trump’s approval had slowly drifted to the 20s and stayed there consistently. Trump’s support was now made up of the very rich and the very poor. Oddly, despite Trump’s near constant demands on Twitter for violence on the part of his supporters, little, if any was reported. Trump had grown so frustrated that he had all but abandoned Twitter at one point for the more receptive Gab social media platform. Though on more than one occasion Rudy Giuliani had made it very clear it was within the rights of the president to declare martial law if he deemed it in the best interests of the nation. More than one delegation of Senate Republicans had gone to the White House to explain to Trump that he was going to be convicted, no avail. Trump made it clear to them, in not so many words that his simply living in the White House made him president, a sentiment best expressed by the legal saw that, “Possession is 9/10ths of the law.”

Finally, a post to Gab came out: “My so-called ‘conviction’ is the work of the Deep State and as such illegitimate. I remain president.”

This set off a chain of events, the likes of which Americans had never seen. Suddenly, everyone on Twitter became a Constitutional scholar as everyone studied the exact wording of the Constitution as to what happens if the president is removed from office by the Senate. The wording is quite clear: he or she is no longer president and that’s it.

Nowhere in the Constitution did it explain what to do if the president simply decided to ignore the Senate. What’s more, nowhere in the Constitution did it state what to do with the nuclear launch codes should a president be removed from office and he refuse to accept the decision of the Senate.

The next few hours were chilling as they were surreal for millions of people not just in the United States but around the globe. The issue of Trump’s physical access to America’s nuclear launch codes was suddenly at the forefront of everyone’s mind. Though it was finally announced that while the nuclear football remained in Trump’s possession, Sec. of Defense Mattis had ordered the American armed forces to stand down for the duration of the crisis.

Trump, on Twitter, was as defiant and unhinged as usual.He threatened to kill himself. He threatened to start a nuclear war. He vowed to declare martial law.

The usual suspects on cable news did their best to spin all of this for Trump. As an anxious nation waited for the now former president to leave the White House, a cavalcade of former Republican Senators and Trump White House staffers attempted to make the former president’s case. Their final argument was that for the good of the country, Trump should be allowed to remain president, despite his lawful conviction by the Senate.

Things began to move rapidly at this point.

Vice President Pence was sworn in but Chief Justice Roberts in a dark, somber event in the Old Executive Building. Meanwhile, it was learned Trump had quietly replaced his Secret Service detail with a private security force that made it clear it was prepared to defend Trump until the bloody end.

At this point, two things happened. A final bipartisan delegation of Congressional leaders came to the White House grounds under the flag of truce. During the course of an hour-long meeting, Trump screamed at them that they had never supported him and the world would be better off if it just ended instead of allowed the forces of the Deep State to ruin America. He made it absolutely clear that he would never leave the Oval Office willingly.

With that, they left.

Next, a surreal, bizarre event, the FBI slowly began to surround the White House. There was much debate online and on TV about how long the nation should wait for Trump to leave the White House. CNN went so far as to do a deep dive into the exact amount of food the White House grounds might have available at any one moment.

Finally, shots rang out from the White House as the battle was joined. It took several hours but in the end, the FBI was finally able to secure the facility. Nearly a dozen personnel on both sides died during the course of the Battle of The White House.

In what would become ionic footage, Trump was quietly escorted from the White House grounds. He spent the remainder of his days ranting on Twitter and Gab that he was the rightful president.

Impeachment Crisis Notes For Sept. 23rd, 2019

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

We have not reached a tipping point yet. There has yet to be a sudden rush towards impeachment by the House Democratic caucus. If it happens at all, it appears it will happen later in the week, maybe in the Thursday – Friday time frame.

The desire to impeach is just about equal to the desire to “let the people decide” in 2020. Every day impeachment hasn’t officially begun is another day that Trump has won. If the articles of impeachment haven’t been sent to the Senate by around Jan. 15th, then all of this is a very moot point.

Mich McConnell is likely to invoke a rule that you can’t try a president in the Senate in the same year as presidential election. That will be the big shock of early 2020. Trump will see this as a gimme. There will not be a free and fair election if this happens.

At least on a Constitutional and strategic level, Nancy Pelosi is now complicit in not punishing Trump. If she doesn’t recognize this for the existential crisis it is and throw resources at the impeachment investigation immediately, history will not judge her kindly.

This is actually, at least superficially, a pretty jaw dropping scandal. Not just Trump, but Pence and Rudy are implicated in all of this. If we were a functioning democracy, they would all be at real risk of having significant legal jeopardy. As it is, lulz.

As mentioned, we’re long past the point where impeachment proceedings and the 2020 campaign don’t overlap. Both influence the other. So, really, the thing we would need to do for a proper impeachment proceedings — investigate every possible avenue of corruption, obstruction of justice, abuse of power and collusion / conspiracy, is simply not viable. Add to this that Pelosi has starved House Democrats of any budget and, really, things are rather bleak.

The only reason why impeachment suddenly came to the forefront in a big way was a massive unforced error on the part of Trump himself. And he is likely to slow walk and stonewall the whole thing as much as possible. Again, this makes the possibility of any sort of successful impeachment proceeding done in a timely manner (read, before mid-Jan. 2020) impossible.

Thus, the whole thing is likely be half-assed and half-hearted. And by the time the articles are voted on, the 2020 campaign will be in full swing. I honestly don’t know how all that would work out. As I said, I believe Leader McConnell is likely to make a big deal of “for the sake of the country” the Senate not try the president during an election year.

Two last things.

One, if I had limited funds and a short amount of time, I would have a day-long hearing with half-dozen psychologists to talk about the president’s state of mind.

House Democrats need to radicalize a little bit and be prepared to do things that might enrage the Right. Namely, I would suggest they use their ability to jail people for contempt in a gratuitous fashion. I saw someone on Twitter use some weird bullshit game theory reason why this would be a bad idea. Fuck that. Just do it. How else are you going to make the criminals running the government take things seriously?

We Don’t Want The Transcript, We Want The Fucking Complaint #TrumpUkraine

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

In the age of Trump, you grow accustomed to getting excited that maybe, at last, political gravity will kick in and Trump will face some sort of consequence for his surreal, criminal and corrupt behavior. House Trump has two ways of combating scandals. One is the Roy Cohen inspired Stormy Daniels Playbook. The other is to slow walk any legal trouble so they can get into their second term so it won’t really matter anymore because we’ll be an authoritarian managed-democracy by that point.

So, right now, Trump is using the mindfuck that brings him such glee — teasing the idea that he’ll release the transcript of the conversation that’s getting him in trouble. This is a multi-layered mindfuck because it conflates what we need — the actual complaint — with the thing that causes people concern about releasing — the transcript.

Therefore, what House Trump believes will happen is they can slow walk releasing the transcript. The tease amps up the hype for the transcript’s political significance. We spend precious months fighting over it and when it comes out, it’s a dud. Trump wins re-election, fuck you.

Meanwhile, the far more damaging thing, the complaint — which legally has to be turned over, natch — goes down the memory hole with Trump’s taxes, fuck you.

For the moment, Trump has the upperhand. He’s too good at this and the press too eager to fall into the same trap over and over again. So, really, I have very low expectations. I see nothing but blue skies for House Trump’s Thousand Year Trump.

Beware ‘The Pence Pivot!’

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I’ve written about this before, but it’s ever more timely. There’s a greater than-zero sum chance that very soon a lot of people are going to The Pence Pivot. This is when at the very point you would otherwise agree with me that maybe Trump was mistake in the first place, you, without missing a beat, say, “It doesn’t matter. Trump’s gone. I support Pence. I didn’t even vote for Trump, really, I voted for Pence.”

This is an outrage on any number of different levels. The chief amongst them being, your previous support of Trump becomes little more than your similar support for the Iraq War based on the lie of WMD. You never have to “own” (as MAGA people are so fond of saying) the fact that you did, at one point, support Trump. And you would still support Trump but for the fact that he’s become so politically toxic that it’s difficult for you to do so. Since you now have a more traditional pol like Pence to support, you have a ready off-ramp for your original insane support of Trump. You don’t have to “own” the political hell you put us all through because you were in a MAGA cult.

Who gets possession of the MAGA cult should the House Trump implode and The Thousand Year Trump doesn’t last…quite…as long is up for debate. A lot it depends on how, exactly, Trump might leave office (By the way, this is impossible. Trump will never resign and he will never be convicted in the Senate.) Really, the only way I could see Trump maybe leaving office is if he could get a full pardon and the right to choose Pence’s successor as veep. If he got that, then either Don Jr. or Ivanka might become veep and be in an ideal position to run for president in their own right to protect Trump’s “legacy.” Ivanka would be a strange one to do that, but you do you daddy’s little girl.

But as of right now, I just don’t see anything coming of TrumpUkraine in the first place. This is probably just another Trump scandal that gets people like me excited, only to fizzle out as the Stormy Daniels Playbook is used ever so effectively.

Let’s Talk About The Right’s False Equivalency About Obama’s Hot Mic Diplomacy & #TrumpUkraine

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I predicted this would be among the Right’s talking points a few days ago and it’s come true. First, they say it’s simply “inappropriate” for Trump to extort a foreign power to get dirt on his likely 2020 rival. So, they introduce the idea that Trump’s simply being “naughty.” He didn’t really do anything wrong, you know. He was just “inappropriate.”

Then, once they’ve established a modicum of displeasure with The Dear Leader, they turn around and say, well, you know, Obama did the same thing when it got caught on a hot mic saying he would have “more flexibility” with the Russians after the 2012 elections.

For stupid people let me point out something.

Using your power as president to pressure a foreign power to trump up false charges about your opponent is not just “inappropriate.” That’s a big boy crime.

Simply suggesting that after the election you might have more diplomatic wiggle room on a political level, that’s this thing called diplomacy. I know MAGA hates black people and especially Obama, but if you’re a talking head on FOX News, I thought you were supposed to be “fair and balanced.”

It’s impressive that otherwise well educated and intelligent people would attempt to pull off such a brazen false narrative. As it always the case, MAGA wants to own the moment, damn the consequences. Even when they’re proven wrong by Trump himself’s statements, they’ve moved on to some other way of sucking the little orange weener.

A Very Simple Case For Trump’s Impeachment

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Despite what the esteemed access journalists of The New York Times and The Washington Post may have you believe, Trump is not a diabolical political theorist. He’s not calculating the subtle messaging necessary to convince a housewife just outside of Phillie in a sexless marriage that she should vote for him despite her reservations.

In fact, Trump is simply a very lucky doofus. He’s nothing more than Being There’s Chauncey Gardner if he was on the cusp of losing his mind. There’s no grand strategy other than some basic mindfucks he learned at the feet of Roy Cohen.

A prime example of this is the origins of the TrumpUkraine clusterfuck. If Trump was REALLY such a fucking modern day Machiavelli don’t you think he would have weighed the political pardon the “poor optics” of Bob Mueller’s testimony to Congress gave him? He might have used his SuperMind to lay low and simply coast to an easy re-election. Then, in his second term, he could turn the switch on his sinister second phase.

Is that what he did? Nope. Smarty pants saw his pardon not as an opportunity to lay the groundwork for the much heralded Thousand Year Trump, but as permission to actively pressure a foreign power to collude with him to hurt his likely political rival in 2020. What’s more, doofus did it on a veritable party line. If that’s not insight into numbnut’s true political savvy, I don’t know what is.

And, as such, that’s why he has to be impeached now, damn the political consequences. He’s proven that he’s not only a barely functioning man-child, he’s a willful one at that.

The only reason why Trump’s been so successful to date is a combination of a strong economy, the idiotic disorganization of his opponents and abject lack of shame on the part of Republicans. He owes everything to outside forces beyond his control. Yes, in a sense, one could say he has a native ability to vocalize the rage of the white disenfranchised volk. But even that is grading on a curve. Why else are people hyping Tucker Carlson in 2024? He’s just another hapless racist doofus who’s been on TV.

The Trump threat is existential. If we don’t go down fighting, then Trump is only going to see this as a sign of weakness and up the ante. Trump is so stupid in real terms, that if he felt like he might actually be not only impeached, but convicted, he might be willing to call up Little Rocket Man and ask him to start a war in an effort to wag the dog.

I wish I was joking, but I’m Not.

That such a suggestion isn’t on the face of it too outrageous to even consider is enough to demand impeachment immediately.

Something’s Gotta Give

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

As of Monday, Sept. 23, 2019, TrumpUkraine is following the usual Trump scandal playbook. It might be happening a little faster because of the severity and brazenness of the alleged crime, but we’re definitely cruising towards this wrapping up as a net plus for House Trump.

The press will willfully give House Trump the cover to appoint a Special Prosecutor to “look into” the Bidens “just to be sure” as a matter of “transparency.” While high information voters will be angry, the average person who doesn’t follow politics will not know who to believe. Besides, the economy is doing well. Lulz.

No one is showing any political courage at this point. There will come a point very soon when we’re so close to the beginning of the 2020 election cycle that Nancy Pelosi will put out a statement saying while Trump should be impeached, for the good of the nation, it’s best if we just “let the people decide” in November 2020.

It’s definitely not looking like absolutely nothing is going to happen to House Trump because of TrumpUkraine. Or, to put it in political terms, while the general consensus will be Trump should be impeached, he won’t be because the 2020 campaign will have begun. Surely he won’t be re-elected, will he?

Without any sense of there being consequences, Trump will grow more brazen. Lulz.

V-Log: A Deep Dive Into Our #TrumpUkraine Political Clusterfuck

Shelton Bumgarner

Some thoughts.

Things May About To Get Extremely Surreal Politically

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Occasionally, I have brief flashes in my mind of a post-Trump Era that doesn’t involve America devolving into Trumplandia. For a brief second, I see America in which House Trump is no longer ascendant. Maybe Tucker Carlson or Tom Cotton may be waiting in the wings to fuck everything up again, but for a moment, at least, America isn’t run by a lawless tyrant.

I doubt this situation would last very long, but for a few months, at least, maybe America might right its ship of state. The thing is, if this were to actually happen, we would look back on the Trump Era in awe. The whole thing is such a catrastrophic culsterfuck that it’s difficult to comprehend that it really did, in fact happen.

There are reasons why this repsite would likely be counted in days or weeks, not even months. The shock of House Trump losing power in some spectator fashion would strike the country totally unprepared. If the mythical Pence Pivot actually did happen the tectonic forces that would be unleashed would be awe inspiring. What’s a personality cult without its personality ? Trump is likely to push positions on both sides as he goes down to some really astonishing extremes. So much so that a lot of pretty prominent MAGA talking heads might have overnight conversions to politics a little less crackpot. If it happened, it would be probably the most astonishing political event of my lifetime. You don’t live a political lie so publically for so long without there being consequences with the normal world snaps back into place.

If you really wanted to drop acid, if somehow even Pence left office abruptly for political reasons, President Nancy Pelosi would have her hands full. Though it would probably make everyone pop a gasket, ideally she would pardon Trump and Pence and vow not to run for the nomination in 2020.

But the idea that not only both Trump and Pence would be pushed out before the 2020 election is, at this point, so completely ridiculous given available datapoints that it’s comical. The Republican field would probably be as big as the Democrat field is right now. Of course the biggest fascist would win and we’d have to fight tooth and nail to prevent Trump from happening all over again in 2020.

In all honesty, I refuse to get my hopes up. The DNI will testify on Thursday, we’ll have a repeat of Mueller’s testimony and darkness will gradually fall on the nation I love so much.