Category: Tsar-A-Largo

Fanciful Constitutional Fixes To A Hacked Election

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

We have no idea right now, for sure, if the Russians successfully hacked the American election through the Internet. We just don’t know. And we probably never will. But, for the sake of argument, what would be the proper reaction to this revelation.

Well, first of all, you can talk about how there should be reforms until you’re blue in the face, but the Vichy Republicans, because both control the government and benefited from the hacking, it’s not like they have any reason to effectively fix the problem.

But let’s suppose something happened and they finally cracked, they finally were absolutely forced to do something, what could they — and we — do? Because we’re dealing with some really serious stuff — Constitutional stuff — fixing the problem would be doubly difficult.

Really, the fixes I can think of are Constitutional in nature.

The one big fix I could see maybe being done is passing a Constitutional amendment making the process of electing a president a Federal issue. This will never happen, of course, but it’s something to think about. But only by removing the electing of the president from 50 individual states can we make it less likely that someone could attack the weaknesses of the weakest one.

But, like I said, this will never happen. There just isn’t the political will for such a huge change to the way we elect presidents. If I had the power, though, I would also get rid of the Electoral College as well. It’s a horrible method of electing a president in modern times and it needs to go. But that, too, will never happen.

One thing people really need to chill out about is the notion of “nullifying” the 2016 election. To call such a proposal a delusional daydream is giving it too much credit. We just have to wait until 2018 to have an effective “do over.” That’s the way the system works and it’s just too bad that the Vichy Republicans are so callow and prostrate before King Trump that the system isn’t working right now.

The whole thing is enough to make one a little sad.

Let’s Play Pretend: What If The Russians Really Did Hack The Election?

By Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I am not one of those who thinks the Russians managed to actually hack into our election booths and throw the election, and, yet, it is kind of weird that Hillary Clinton lost Pennsylvania and Florida. Spooky weird.

So, let’s play pretend.

What could we do, after the fact, if we proved 100% that Russian hackers had managed to hack into our election systems and throw the election for Donald Trump. Then what?

Well, the short answer is: WE ARE COMPLETELY FUCKED.

There simply is no effective method to nullify a presidential election. It’s not like we can recall the Electoral College and tell them to vote for someone else. That ship, as they say, has sailed. It is not a bug, but a feature of our system that it’s so difficult to get rid of a president once he or she is in office. It’s that stability that has helped us weather any number of catastrophes over the centuries.

I mean, even if we got rid of Trump, we still have Pence who is not as bad as Trump in some ways because he’s at least sane, but worse in others because he has an ideology that he adheres to when it comes to his absolute world view. And there is zero possibility that the Vichy Republicans would impeach BOTH Trump and Pence, and even if they did, we have Paul Ryan to deal with, who is a gutless stooge to Trump if ever there was one.

So, really, there’s nothing we can do. The revelation that the Russians had successful hacked out election would probably cause a epic, if momentary, Constitutional Crisis, but the thing that people like me want — a center-Left president who does what Hillary Clinton would have done had she become president simply is completely, totally impossible. It simply is not going to happen.

We’re stuck with Republicans for a sold two year and they can do all sorts of damage to the traditional welfare state between now and 2019, which would be the earliest we could start to fix this problem and that only works on the assumption that a Blue Wave might flip the Congress Democratic.

And, really, the only scenario that comes anywhere near being a reality is in 2019 the Democratic Congress manages to impeach both Trump and Pence, blocks Pence from naming a successor and then we endup with President Nancy Palosi. That’s pretty much an impossible scenario for various reasons, in large part because the hysterical 30% of the population who hates Hillary Clinton would hate Nancy Palosi just as much. America has some serious fucking problems in its political system and they ain’t going no where anytime soon. Let that sink in, folks.

So, dry your tears. Pull yourself up. We’re fucked. Really, the only thing we can do is, as I keep suggesting, engage people who disagree with us. Try to overcome tribal politics as best we can and try to heal the bizarre wounds that risk tearing the nation asunder.

Vichy Republicans & The Fall Of The American Republic

By Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Someone said on Twitter that it felt like Trumplandia was “cratering” tonight. I would strongly say the opposite. Because of the callow, craven nature of the Vichy Republicans that have essentially given absolute control to Donald J. Trump, things are only going to get worse for the foreseeable future.

Only if something really, really telling happen, like a Jeremy Corbyn win in Great Britain would I sit back, rub my beard and mull the possibility that maybe that things have gone to far. Something like that would give me some hope that maybe the pendulum is swinging back toward some form of sanity. I say that as someone who fears if Corbyn won you’d have to que the Benny Hill music when it comes to British politics. It’d be kind of nuts, if fun, if it happened.

Sorry for the noise in the background on this one.

Regardless, domestically, at least we can only take solace in the fact that it appears as though Trump has lost Twitter. Or, maybe, the Russian hackers that manipulated Twitter aren’t getting paid anymore so they’ve moved on. It used to be that you couldn’t have an actual serious conversation about Trump without whack jobs popping out of the woodwork all but demanding you bow down before Trump as Lord Zood. But that has changed in a weird way. It’s the silence that’s really weird. Trump hasn’t lost Periscope yet, so I guess he has that to be thankful for. Periscope users are still completely nuts.

I continue to be really unhappy with where things are going with Trumplandia. The Vichy Republicans are to blame for this and nothing is going to change as long as they’re in power. So, we’re stuck with Trump for a solid 18 months, at least, and that doesn’t even begin to factor in the errant power grab on his part caused by a major crisis that may happen with, or without, his approval and goading.

The Vichy Republicans are allowing Trump to sow division both at home and abroad. They are completely complicit n all of this and I pretty much think we’re on track for the fall of the American Republic. By that, I mean, like the frog in the slowly boiling pot, we may very well wake up one day soon and some pretty basic right will be gone. I don’t know how exactly it will all happen, but it will happen.

Why am I so sure? Well, the silence on the part of the Vichy Republicans is so loud and the cancer on the American body politic that is Trumplandia seems to be metastasizing so quickly that what other inevitability could there possibly be? Not to sound too much like a Debby Downer, but I really need some hope. I need something to latch on to — like a Corbyn win — to give me some indication that there will be a happy end to this dark period.

I place all our problems at the feet of the Vichy Republicans. If they would put country over party, then the system of Constitutional checks and balances put in place by the Founding Fathers would actually, like, work and stuff. But as it stands, we have a tyrannical, would-be autocratic madman at the center of the nation’s political universe. What’s worse, he keeps alienating everyone but is base through erratic tweets, pulling out of important international agreements, and generally being a monumental dick.

But because the Vichy Republicans are addicted to power above all else, and the Republican base that elected Trump and continues to support him has absolute sway over them politically, there is nothing that might induce them to have anything resembling a backbone. It’s just not going to happen until they’re kicked out of office. I’d like to think that a Blue Wave of The Resistance might do the trick, but may be deluding myself. Given that people are dropping out of Congressional races due to death threats, that pot may be a lot closer to boiling than
I would like to admit.

Really, it seems as though if power is the only thing that the Vichy Republicans care about, then the only time they may get a backbone is about a year from now should it appear as though they are going to lose “bigly” in the 2018 mid-terms. If that doesn’t seem to be the case, they won’t say a peep. But if things take a dramatic turn for the worse between now and, say, July 2018, there might, just might, be an unprecedented series of events where by the Vichy Republicans finally grow a pair and demand some accountability from the Trump Administration.

Even more interesting, as I have mentioned before elsewhere, if the Vichy Republicans lose Congress in November 2018, there might be a battle during the lame duck session of Congress between Republicans and Democrats to see who gets to impeach Trump first. The reason being, the Republicans would want the right to approve now President Mike Pence’s replacement.

And that doesn’t even begin to address my true nightmare scenario for 2019 whereby Trump would simply pardon everyone involved in Tsar-a-Largo — including himself — and hold up on the White House with the nuclear codes and dare anyone to come after him. A shoot out between the Secret Service and FBI on the White House lawn would be, uh, unique from a historical standpoint.

I guess all of this comes back to the point that we shouldn’t assume history goes in a straight line. We could very well be at the end of the road for the American Republic as we have conceived of it for about 240 years now. This could be it. The end. We could be, from now on, a semi-autocratic quasi-religious imperial system with only the assurance of an open presidential seat every eight years being our last foot hold to our republican past.

It pains me to suggest such a thing, but we can’t delude ourselves into thinking the Vichy Republicans will ever grow a backbone. We could be stuck with Trumplandia for four or eight more years and then we really would need someone to make America great again.

All I can say is what I’ve been saying — stay engaged. Don’t rage, engage is the catch phrase I’ve come up with. It’s a pithy explanation for my personal vision for how we dig ourselves out of this hole. There are no easy answers when it comes to Trumplandia.

We just have to have hope that the American spirit is stronger than a despot who would aim to inflict a “managed democracy” on us from above. Don’t take anything for granted, folks. This party has just begun.

Shelton Bumgarner is the editor and publisher of The Trumplandia Report. He may be reached at migukin (at) gmail.com.

Revolution Article 5: Yo, Trump, What Is Going On, Brah?

r Article 5 of the NATO treaty, the article that is the essence of the treaty because it says an attack on one is an attack on all, was all Donald Trump’s. In fact, he didn’t tell anyone he was going to do it beforehand.

This is all very surreal.

What is going on? What would Trump do such a thing? This is an example of how the possibility of there being collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russians is having very real consquences. This is, needless to say, a nightmare situation for American foreign policy because it really disrupts the very foundations of the United States’ relations with its European allies.

What happens if, say, Russian invades Ukraine in a general ground war. What do you say to Poland, which might grow understandably nervous at all of this. Or, God forbid, what happens to a Baltic state should Russia invade it. There is now no assurance that the States will swoop in to save the day.

These are scary times and there are no easy answers, especially since the party you would think would be the mos upset about all of this, the Republican Party, is now Vichy, callow and prostrate at the feet of the quisling Donald J. Trump. It’s a tragedy and there is no easy way out. None at all.

Only by removing Trump from office might this nightmare be over and things might snap back into place. But that is a fanciful daydream at this point. We’ve got a solid 18 months of Trumplandia to deal with, if not significantly longer.

I wish there was something I could say that would make sense of all of this, but I am at a loss for words. A lot can happen in 18 months and we’re one major incident either domestic or foreign between ourselves and a major catastrophe.

The Big Sigh: If We Prove Trump Colluded With The Russians, It Won’t Matter

By Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

If the rise of Trumplandia has proven anything, it’s that a fool and his nation’s self-respect and autonomy are soon departed. That core 30% of the electorate who is Donald Trump’s base simply won’t care if we prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that his 2016 campaign colluded — hell, even co-ordinated — with the Russians. It’s just not important to them as they sit back in their recliner threatening to smack their wife and drinking a cold one as they think about the job at the coal mine.

The Tsar-a-Largo scandal that is rattling its way through Washington is pretty much a Washington issue. And there is a real risk that even if Trump is impeached and convicted that instead of going the fuck away,he, like Richard Nixon before him, will become some sort of warped martyr for the those people who are so extreme in their conservative world view that down is up and hot is cold.

And that wouldn’t even begin to address the fundamental crisis that the American Republic current is suffering. Trump, a racist, bigoted, misogynist demagogue managed to make his way through the system and not only survive but prosper. Something is not right with this picture.

Additionally, there is no sign that the Vichy Republicans have in any way grown a backbone. They are still callow, complicit and prostrate before King Trump I, Autocrat of All The American States. It seems as though history is moving at light speed these days and we simply don’t have time to catch up.

It is very possible that we’ve entered a new, dangerous dystopian epoch in our nation’s history and it could be a very long time before we can look back and have some frame of reference to figure out how fucked up things are. There are some basic questions that I simply don’t have the answer to. Will the Vichy Republicans ever care about the nation and its Constitutional order? What will be the ultimate outcome of this chronic Constitutional crisis that seems to flare up every few weeks?

I just don’t know the answer to these and other questions. And, just like Watergate, people could still be puzzling over how it all happened and why decades after the fact. Given how elaborate and epic this imbroglio is, it is probably very likely that many, many, many books will be written about Tsar-a-Largo, regardless of the outcome.

Just the idea that the Republican Party, the party not only of Lincoln but of Ike, Nixon and Reagan would kowtow to a foreign power so willingly — especially Russia! — simply for the sake of obtaining and maintaining power boggles this child of the Cold War’s mind. This is seriously fucked up, is all I gotta say.

It’s a modern historic tragedy, on a par with Vichy France, and because it’s happening to us right now, we can’t make sense of it all. We live in extraordinary times and my only suggestion is that perhaps this is a knee jerk reaction against eight years of “No Drama Obama.”

But, regardless, as I’ve said before, American civil society continues to reel from the growth and power of Trumplandia and we just have to have hope. We have to stop raging at the insane things that happen as a part of Trumplandia and we need to start engaging with its citizens to try to figure out what makes them tick.

Only then, maybe we can bridge the gap between us and figure how to get them to take Tsar-a-Largo as the serious threat to the Republic that 70% of the electorate thinks it is.

Trump 2019: A Nightmare Scenario

By Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

As I have repeatedly said that I am not really that hopefully that there will be a Blue Wave in 2018. Donald Trump is just too oddly adept at appeasing the base of Trumplandia for it to happen. But, for the sake of argument, let’s assume that The Resistance wins big in 2018.

This is where things might get interesting.

What might happen is there could be a titanic struggle between the suddenly woke Vichy Republicans and The Resistance Democrats to see who will impeach Trump. I suggest this because, well, if the Republicans push through an impeachment during a lame duck session after the November election, then they would have the ability to pick who Mike Pence’s replacement might be. So if things get really, really bad politically for Trump, you might have the Republicans finally finding their backbone while Democrats would be against impeachment simply because they wanted to wait a few months so they could do it themselves.

But the much more ominous scenario is the Democrats impeach and convict Donald Trump in early 2019, but Trump turns around and pardons everyone — including himself — as part of the process, and claims the whole thing is thus illegitimate and won’t acknowledge it.

You want a Constitutional crisis, now that would be a Constitutional crisis.

I don’t even know what could possibly happen then. Would the FBI and the Secret Service have a shoot out on the White House grounds to evict Trump? How would we wrestle the nuclear codes from Trump if he was hold up in Trump Tower like a madman, tweeting his every thought with abandon?

That, of course, is a nightmare scenario and highly unlikely to happen. But it would be a fitting in to the Trumplandia Era.

Wag The Dog: Trump’s Leaving The Paris Accord & Tsar-A-Largo

By Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

It seems like there is a growing possibility that instead of attacking North Korea as we all feared, Donald Trump instead pulled out of the Paris Accord as a kind of value free wag the dog. Instead of killing millions of people in the short term to save his administration, he put the lives of billions at risk in the long term.

One trap that is too easy for people like me to fall into is the notion that Trump finally, finally did something so egregious that he will face some sort of political consequence. It is far too easy for people like me to throw up our hands in giddy outrage, and think that there’s no way that Trump can recover from his latest screw up.

But given his strategy is to pander to a base that is surreal in its hysterics and unwillingness to have any connection to reality, and given how that base has almost absolute sway over the Vichy Republican Establishment, it seem as though Trump will not only survive but prosper politically.

That’s the whole point of all of this. People like me get angry, people who support Trump are ecstatic and everyone is distracted from the horrific agenda that the Trump Administration is pushing through Congress. There comes a point, however, when this cycle has to be broken. There comes a point when The Resistance can’t be distracted from the goal at hand: finding out the truth about the possibility of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russians that hacked into the American political cycle in 2016. That’s where we need to focus our political might and political questions.

Of course, there is the very real possibility that given how callow and Vichy the Republicans are a this point, we could literally find evidence of direct collusion between the Trump campaign and Russians and that still wouldn’t be enough to make them raise an eyebrow. They would simply shrug and say no laws were broken and if you really are all that upset about it, come back in 2018 and flip Congress.

That, in itself, is an outrage because such thinking only leads to a chronic Constitutional crisis that will flare up now and again. What’s more, in the 18 months we would have to wait, there would be plenty — plenty — of opportunity for the now illegitimate Trump Administration to do get into all sorts of mischief. Out of sheer desperation, there is a chance they might do something significantly more desperate than simply pull out of a treaty.

Leaving the Paris Accord might not be the last straw politically for the Trump Administration, but merely the first step. If it sees that it has successfully waged the dog with such a distraction, it may feel forced to take the strategy to the next level and actually do as we all fear and actually get people killed by starting a real war with real lives at risk in Korea or Iran.

This is not some idle, imaginary situation. It seems a very real possibility that if the gross malfeasance of the Trump Administration to date is any indication, they won’t blink an eye to use whatever means necessary to push through their hateful agenda.

That I’m getting so worked up about this proves I’m right. Trump is using the Paris Accord departure to piss people like me off, while fluffing the base. All Steve Bannon cares about is placating the base and if there is one thing that core 30% of the population that makes up Trumplandia loves, is seeing the liberal Washington Establishment run around like a chicken with its head cut off.

So, you can explain to me all you like how Trump’s reasoning for leaving the Paris Accord is complete and total bullshit, that’s besides the point. Trumplandia elected Trump to stir the pot, and the more Trump does just that, the more Trumplandia gets a raging hard-on.

That’s why we really need to cool it about getting so upset about the Paris Accord. We have to prioritize. We need to put issues in something akin to triage. And while it may hurt to do this, to not be so angry about leaving the Paris Accord, it’s far more important that we focus absolutely on Tsar-a-Largo.

Proving collusion between the Russians and the Trump campaign, while not criminal, would be a very effective hammer against the Vichy Republicans in 2018 and would likely eventually result in impeachment proceedings. Remember, impeachment is a political act and so collusion and the coverup of such collusion would likely rise to the bar of an impeachable act. And that doesn’t even begin to address all the crazy bullshit Trump has done since he got elected.

Hence, I would suggest we keep our eyes on the prize. Don’t get distracted. Don’t allow Trump to wag the dog through his decision to leave the Paris Accord. Keep your powder dry and get ready for the real fight, the fight that may eventually bring Trump down at last.

Shelton Bumgarner is the editor and publisher of the Trumplandia Report. He may be reached at migukin (at) gmail.com.

Today Was Surreal, Even In The Age Of Trumplandia

By Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

We have grown accustomed to surreal things happening in this Age of Trumplandia, but today was even more surreal than usual. The big news, of course, was Donald Trump’s decision to pull out of the Paris Climate Accord. In a Rose Garden address, he gave a pretty bullshit filled explanation for why he did it. It’s my impression that he, as usual, use the opportunity to explain how great and wonderful his administration has been to date. I don’t know this for a fact because I couldn’t bear to watch the address and so I got my information about it second hand from Twitter.

Generally, Twitter was aghast at Trump’s decision. One thing I’ve been reminded over and over again of late, however, is that just because Trump’s lost Twitter — at least the portion of it I follow — doesn’t mean he doesn’t still have a lot of hardcore followers — Trumplandia, if you will.

So the people of The Resistance on Twitter can circle jerk their anger at Trump all they want to, if they want to effect change, if they want to do anything about Trumplandia, they’re going to have go outside their comfort zone and wade into the surreal crazy waters where Trump is still popular. I say that to myself as much as I do anyone else. It’s tough though, really tough.

Meanwhile, in other surreal news, Devin Nunes, who allegedly had recused himself from leading the House investigation into Tsar-a-Largo, apparently issued some subpoenas not to get to the bottom of that problem, but of another problem dear to his heart — the notion that there was some evil “unmasking” that took place on the part of the Obama Administration. It really is enough to make you say, “Oh, for fuck’s sake.”

Put these two events together and you really have a surreal day. We can laugh all we want to at covfefe, but the time for laugher or rage is over. We need to start getting a lot more serious about how we act towards Trumplandia. We need to realize that there is a very real chance that Trump will eventually manage to mitigate, if not overcome his staggering malfeasance to such an extent that he is able to take the damage he’s inflicting on the nation at home and abroad to the next level.

There are alarming signs that he may be able to do just that sooner rather than later. No enormous bombshells have gone off for a few days and he continues to mull a major shake up of White House staff. As people keep saying, a fish rots from its head, so there is also the possibility that Trump can shake things all he wants and his personal inability to be a good president will get in the way.

One thing we can not assume, and that’s the Trump is going anywhere anytime soon. He’s not quitting and he’s not getting impeached. And even if he did get impeached, he’s probably not going to be convicted. We’re stuck with him. We’re stuck with him for at least a sold two years, and I only mention that because the 2018 mid-terms are the first opportunity The Resistance has to do anything about Trump.

But history does not go in a straight line. Russians could hack into the election system again. Trump could wag the dog in the DPRK or Iran. Any number of different things could happen would allow Trump to ease on past the 2018 mid-terms and sprint to 2020 and beyond. That’s why we have to stop raging and start engaging. That’s why we have to stop laughing at Trump and start taking his policies seriously.

The sooner we do these things, the sooner we can put Trumplandia behind us and get to work making America great again, the greatest it had before January 20, 2017.

The Damage Wrought By The Trump Administration May Be Irrevocable

By Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

The truly frightening thing about the Trump Administration is the damage it inflicts upon the United States both domestically and internationally may be irrevocable. The damage might have been mitigated if Congress wasn’t run by Vichy Republicans, but, alas, that’s just not the case.

With Trump’s decision to leave the Paris Climate Accords, the United States has now begun a dangerous, unprecedented journey into unprecedented and turbulent waters. What’s worse, for the residents of Trumplandia, they see Trump’s decision to pull out of the accords as yet another campaign promise kept.

All of this is pretty surreal to me. The very people who 20 or 30 years ago would have called for the head of anyone who so willfully played into the strategic aims of the Russians, now applaud someone who seems hell bent on completely upending some pretty core beliefs that the people we once considered the Part of Reagan were supposed to hold so dear.

Again, I have to reflect on how similar all of this is to Vichy France. This is a truly bizarre situation politically and it’s even more bizarre given that it takes four years to get out of the Paris Accords and we won’t be officially out of them until the day after election day in 2020.

What concerns me the most is that while we’re all so busy falloning over the latest comical screw up on the part of Donald Trump, we’re going to totally miss the significant, long-term damage Trump is going to inflict upon us. The only thing I can compare this to is a even more damaging version of the Reagan Revolution of 1981 that caused so much harm to the American middle class.

We may very look back at this period as the moment when not only did America grow sicker, poorer and less educated, but we lurched towards an semi-imperial autocratic form of government, with the Constitutionally mandated open presidential seat every eight years being the only thing the only thing that prevent us from conspicuously no longer being a republic.

The truly horrific quality to all of this is there a slow-moving train crash quality to it all. We can see what is happening, but because of the callow, complicit nature of the Vichy Republicans, there is little, if nothing, we can do in real terms to stop what we’re seeing and experiencing.

With America in retreat, there now exists a moral power vacuum. A land rush is now happening as different regional powers struggle and jostle to figure out where they stand in this new reality. Even if the United States at some point in the future came roaring back through effective leadership, the damage is already done. And that doesn’t even begin to address the chaos we’ll have to live through should the DPRK attack South Korea or Russia attack Ukraine in a general war.

So, this has stopped being funny to me. I’m not saying I won’t laugh when Stephen Colbert tears into Trump during his monologue, but we’ve reached the point where there is officially a serious edge to things. We have a mad, tyrannical emperor on our hands whose only check is his own egregious incompetence and active malfeasance.

If there’s anything we can do to fix this situation, it is to actively use our rights while we still have them. Don’t rage, engage. Keep fighting the good fight. Don’t lose hope. I would like to think that the American spirit is stronger even than a president with unchecked power because of the surreal obsequiousness of his party.

Americans aren’t Russians, so you can spout all the political theory you like at me about how easy it will be for Trump to inflict a “managed democracy” on the United States through the tried and true methods of a modern autocracy, I just don’t buy it.

I’m not saying that Trump will be impeached. Nor am I saying that even if he is impeached that he will be convicted. I am saying, however, that while I honesty do fear for the fate of the Republic, that I fear my long-standing worry that Trump is an existential threat to its continued success is being realized, I also have an innate hope that we’ll bounce back a lot quicker than anyone might expect.

I just don’t see the American people standing for the dystopian reality that is too easy for me to project. It just seems like something’s gotta give eventually. I don’t know what it will be, but it seems like even if we’re living in an autocracy now, that the traditional ebb and flow of American politics will simply be too great for it to last.

We survived the Civil War, we survived Prohibition and we’ll survive this.

I hope.

Shelton Bumgarner is the Editor and Publisher of The Trumplandia Report. He may be reached at migukin (at) gmail.com.

Let’s Face It, Trump Probably Isn’t Going To Get Impeached

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

A cold hard fact of modern American politics is the Republicans are so complicit, so Vichy in their support for the possibly treasonous administration of Donald Trump that we’re stuck with Trump for a solid two years, if not longer.

The conditions that have brought us to this point are so complex that they probably would require a few fairly long books to fully detail. The United States is so politically polarized — and the Right so well organized when it comes to a culture of faux victimization — that even if it’s proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that Trump personally colluded with the Russians, he just ain’t getting impeached anytime soon.

And I am not one who believes there is any assurance that there will be a “Blue Wave” in 2018. It could be that there will be a lot talk but for various reasons nothing will happen. That two, four, six years from now we’ll still be talking about how if only this or that thing happened Trump will be impeached.

What’s more, remember that even if Trump was impeached by the House, it doesn’t mean he would be convicted by the Senate. That’s something that’s never happened in our nation’s history and since Trump will never resign, his conviction would be the only way to get rid of him.

We’re entering a surreal time in our nation’s political history where we’re so polarized that while about half the nation is openly talking about collusion, treason and impeachment then conviction, the other half think it’s just an evil plot by unpatriotic loser liberals who are looking for a reason to explain their unexpected Electoral College loss.

It’s all enough to leave you bewildered.

Even worse from my point of view, there’s no reason to believe Trump won’t right his personal ship of state and not only survive, but prosper. He may very well serve out his term and manage to use his weirdly adroit political skill to get Mike Pence elected as his successor.

A lot of my worry about this possible scenario comes from the division and weakness of The Resistance. The Democratic Party is split between the liberal Hillary Clinton wing and the social democratic Bernie Sanders wing and it’s easy to imagine that rift opening up to such an extent that a major center-Left independent candidate would run in 2020 and we’d really be fucked.

History rarely goes in a straight line, so there are any number of different ways things might play out. An unexpected strong candidate out of left field like Jon Stewart might throw a lot of my personal assumptions out the window.

But my main concern is that the United States isn’t a liberal democracy anymore. That we’ve entered a new epoch in our history where the only thing that prevents us from being a semi-imperial autocracy is the fact that there’s an assured open presidential seat every eight years. When the final political history of the United States is written that quirk of our Constitutional system may be seen as the thing that made it more difficult for us to realize that we had finally evolved out of our traditional republican roots.

The really scary thing about the Trump Administration is there is a real risk that it will do irrevocable harm to the country in ways that may take generations to fix. Our decades old reputation as the moral leader of the free world may be gone for good. It might require some exceptional leadership on the part of future presidents to bring that back and the system we have now is so corrupt that it’s unlikely that is going to happen anytime soon.

If it weren’t for that particular aspect, the Trump Administration wouldn’t be so scary. The thing about Trump is it’s too easy to fall into the trap of falloning him when he tweets something like covfefe to such an extent that we totally lose sight of him leaving the Paris Accords or appointing psychopathic Federal judges or whatever. The amount of damage Trump can inflict on the republic is so wide and deep that it is breathtaking.

What’s even more disheartening is there is really no recourse other than being politically engaged. As I have begun to say at every opportunity: Don’t rage, engage. Do your civic duty on an individual level to help, even in a small way, the continuance of our civil society. Don’t assume that just because someone disagrees with you that they are trolling you. Vote. Protest. Speak out when given the opportunity. Call your Representative and Senator on a regular basis.

The strength of American civil society is pretty much all we got at this point. It may take generations for the full impact of the Trump Administration to be fully understood. But don’t have any regrets. Don’t look back and realize you didn’t do your part to prevent a dystopia from being not just the thing of fanciful dreams, but a very cold, hard reality.

Shelton Bumgarner is the Editor and Publisher of The Trumplandia Report. He may be reached at migukin (at) gmail.com.