Midterm Blues

My record as a prognosticator when it comes to elections is, let's say, sketchy at best, so I wouldn't blame anyone for putting on their skeptic hat at this point. But I'm not even talking about results – rather, about various factors and vectors that could feed into this process.

First off, the midterm elections are about Trump. And if you say gas prices, that's about Trump too. And so is everything else. And this is nothing new, since midterms are always about the president who happens to be in office at the time. So whether it makes any sense or not, your state and local elections, right down to the level of dogcatcher, are going to be about Trump. As the old activist song went, “Which side are you on?” (Implication – you have to be on a “side”. It would be downright un-American to be neutral.)

So let's talk about Trump's base, and more specifically the base known as MAGA. MAGA had its heyday in the first Trump administration. There was a sense of euphoria... of triumphalism... of inevitability... of revolution, even (or counter-revolution, technically), and the movement survived all of the attempts – many of them successful – to oppose and defeat Trump's initiatives and programs, and to remove him from office. But on the practical side – to paraphrase a song of some years back -- Trump fought D.C. and the mainstream media, and D.C. and the media won. So Trump wound up operating as, in many ways, a lame duck from the first day of his first term. (The “never Trumpers” in the Republican Party didn't help. But where are they now?)

But, like any halfway decent politician (not that he is one), Trump learned. He learned many lessons, and the most important one was that his opponents in the government and the media, who on any given day present an outward appearance of being kind of wishy-washy and wimpy, if not outright eunuchs, are in actuality the meanest, most vicious animals in the jungle. After all, they haven't stayed in power and in positions of influence for all these years – decades! – by being nice. So basically, he underestimated them the first time around, but when he began his second (non-continuous) term, he had his ducks more in a row and was loaded for bear (think DOGE).

So Trump, as of January of 2025, started out much stronger and more capable. He was tanned, rested, and ready – as the saying goes. He hit the ground running – and his MAGA base had survived the Biden years more or less intact. But then he and his administration tried their hand at some real issues, like:

• The Epstein files

• UFOs

• Ukraine

• Palestine/Israel/Gaza

• Iran

(They toyed a bit with the JFK assassination, and with 9/11, but apparently decided those topics were still too hot to handle after all this time. Plus it was “old news”, and nothing more had been added to what we already know. This was the allegation (either explicit or implied) at least, and so both of these issues were re-buried for the umpteenth time.)

The problem was that with each of these issues, and with their mishandling, Trump and his administration lost some measure of credibility with not only the citizenry in general, but also with their formerly solid base. So I suspect that there's a certain group – let's call it ex-MAGA – who are quietly disillusioned and who are unwilling to “vote Trump” next month, either by voting for other candidates or not voting at all.

Then you have the so-called independents, who may have voted for Trump in 2024 but who are more reality-based, and who may be suffering from “buyer's regret”, and who – like the ex-MAGA contingent – may vote otherwise or simply stay home. (These are, as is well known, the most flexible segment of the voting citizenry, and it's because they actually pay attention – not just to propaganda, but to results. And they don't get all sentimental about which party their parents or grandparents always voted for. They are, I would say, more “reality-based” than the loyal members of either of the major parties, and they constitute a swing vote in many cases.) (I wouldn't say that the “swing” in the “swing states” is composed entirely of independents, but they are a major factor, along with the people who just decide to stay home. You can vote by not voting, in other words – and both parties know this all too well.)

And of course the main problem with the issues listed above is there has been no resolution. No closure. Nothing to satisfy anyone's curiosity.

• The Epstein files remain a closed book, by and large – at least the “good stuff” – simply because they implicate pretty much the entirety of the ruling elite. Not that Trump is a member of the ruling elite, mind you (his main offense is that he's not in “the club”, and has no interest in being in it) – but he can't very well afford to offend them by exposing their, let's say, less-than-commendable interests and habits. And it's not certain if he realized this at first; the thinking then was “Aha! Now we'll catch all those Democrat and liberal pre-verts!” But upon digging a bit deeper, it turned into “Oops. Never mind. Nothing to see here.” And when the government says that, it's precisely because there is “something to see here”. So... excuses were made, jobs were lost, and the whole business was tossed down the memory hole – or at least an attempt was made, but we know how things live on on the Internet. But the bottom line was – zero closure! Zero justice! And we're still arguing about who, or what, killed Epstein. (When there are that many people who want you dead, it hardly matters who actually did the actual deed.) (Or I guess he could be alive and well and living on some tropical island with Hitler and Elvis and Jimmy Hoffa.)

• UFOs – Oy, this ball has been tossed around ever since the late 1940s, and as always, any sort of inquiry or investigation runs into a wall of silence, along with bureaucratic, and this case military, resistance. (“Secret weapons” are supposed to stay secret, right?) Plus, the perennial problem is that you have people who are, basically, kooks or in denial, on both sides of the issue. It's “the truth is out there” vs. “there's nothing out there, it's just swamp gas, you're all imagining things, etc.” So once again, after great fanfare it quickly turns into a non-story and a non-issue. Another self-inflicted wound on the part of the administration. (The parallels with the JFK assassination and 9/11 are striking, in that in each case you have two opposing camps – the “conspiracy theorists” vs. the standard, i.e. government narrative, types. In this case it seemed like some in the administration were toying with the conspiracy position, but that was quashed quite promptly.)

• Ukraine – For starters, why did Russia let Ukraine go after the Soviet Union broke up? Could they really have done nothing to keep it within the fold? Either they couldn't (things were a bit chaotic there for a while) or they chose not to. But now they have the prospect of NATO being right on their doorstep, which Russia not only doesn't want, but we promised them it wouldn't happen and then broke that promise. So here we are, “saving democracy” for a corrupt and allegedly-democratic country that is in a war with a corrupt and never-democratic country. I swear, I think we got along better with the Soviet Union (“godless communism”) than we do with the Russia of today. And the U.S./NATO side of the issue has apparently never heard of “buffer zones”, which are a time-honored way of keeping major powers out of each other's hair. Why can't Ukraine be neutral? And if they are incapable of doing that on their own, why not move a U.N. peacekeeping force into Ukraine? We did it with (former) Yugoslavia. Clearly someone wants to keep this conflict going, as long as it doesn't get too hot (i.e. nukes). And if our “NATO partners” were too short-sighted to anticipate this, why did we have to be? So... chalk up a kind of stalemate, which we are heavily invested in with no clear result.

• Palestine/Israel/Gaza – another no-win situation (for us) because, quite simply, we have to share the blame for anything Israel does. So even if certain radical Muslim groups are determined to make themselves (and the citizens of Gaza) into martyrs, their blood winds up on our hands – or so many will say. (Unlike the Epstein and UFO and Ukraine issues, I'm willing to admit that this one was pretty much unavoidable. A Democrat administration would be just as entrapped in it as the Trump administration is.) (There's a faint echo here of the war in Vietnam, which had precursors in a Republican administration, but reached a high point in a Democratic administration, but then it landed in Nixon's lap and he wound up getting blamed for something that had been going on for many years.) (One might also ask why we have a habit of getting out of wars only by means of unconditional surrender, which is far from traditional from a historical point of view.)

• Iran – Well, once again, the stage was set decades ago, long before Trump or MAGA came on the scene, and yet they have appointed themselves the ones who can save the day like Mighty Mouse. As Daniel McCarthy said in a recent column, “Many Trump supporters are... outraged that we are in yet another Middle East war with no end in sight.” And if it comes to sending troops in, we could wind up being “waist deep in the Big Muddy” again (that expression dates from the war in Vietnam). And besides, some people are starting to suspect that the radical Muslim mindset is such that they not only don't mind dying for a cause, but absolutely relish martyrdom, since it advances their cause in the long run. This is something Americans can't be expected to understand, of course – and much less Trump and his administration, who want nothing more than to nail Iran's skin to the barn door (this is a re-boot of what LBJ said about Vietnam). The irony is that we're fighting to, supposedly, remedy a situation that started long ago with our interference in Iranian politics. So even if the Iranians win by losing, we will wind up losing by winning, because it will further solidify our image of being at war with Islam.

• And while we're at it, let's not forget all the relatively trivial, but highly symbolic, self-inflicted wounds like the Kennedy Center, the ballroom, the reflecting pool, and the arch. There was absolutely no necessity for Trump to pile on with this stuff, but he did, and feedback has been almost entirely negative.

So these are all things that could impact the upcoming elections, but even if they do will it make a significant difference? The Democrats and the Democratic Socialists dream of returning to the glories of the Biden years, with open borders (non-borders actually), no ICE, defunding the police, a benign attitude toward urban violence and anarchy, and whatever else contributes to the gradual (or not-so-gradual) destruction of the America that the MAGA types believe in (and imagine that it still exists, or can at least be revived to some extent). The DSA candidates and sympathizers believe they are the wave of the future; well, maybe they are, but that doesn't say anything about what that future will be like in actual practice (although there are plenty of models available, like the Soviet Union). On the other side, are Trump and his people – the MAGA core – clinging to an illusion? Does the America they want to save even still exist? There's plenty of evidence that it doesn't – that it's composed largely of wishful thinking and nostalgia (with flags and flyovers). It's become all symbol and all myth with no substance, in other words. And both sides claim to want to “save democracy”, which is a shorthand way of saying “the government doing things my way and not those other people's way (because we're the good guys and they're evil)”. Is that really the democratic process in action, or is it more like gang warfare? On any given day, it seems almost exclusively like the latter; everything else is hot air, hypocrisy, and the lust for power.

So... I don't think this election is any more “the most important election of our lifetime” than any other. Every election is called that by everybody these days. For some, it will be no more than a bump in the road; for others, a turning point of some sort. Who are the revolutionaries of our time, and who are the counter-revolutionaries? It's getting to the point where no one can make any sense of it, and maybe it doesn't matter. Ultimately – and I hate to agree with Nietzche on this – it's all about power, and the language that supports power, and the thought processes (including delusions and paranoia) that language represents. And no matter the outcome, some will declare it “the end of America”. Well – it may be the end of their America, but if that America no longer exists, or in fact never has existed, maybe the Age of Ideas is passing away, and a new Age of Realism is dawning. Unlikely? Probably. But isn't some hope better than no hope at all? 

Yes Kings!

 

Someone once said that the American political system is most curious. We elect a king every four years, and after four years in office that king has to run for re-election. And if he loses, he has to depart without protest and turn his throne over to someone else.

Curious indeed. But think about it – back in 1776, was there a country anywhere on earth that wasn't ruled by a king, emperor, or tyrant of some sort? (I can't think of a single example, but I'll have to check on Switzerland.) So this idea of a monarchy was pretty much universal and pretty much accepted. Even if a monarch was deposed, or even killed, he was soon replaced by another monarch (England being a very temporary exception). So this notion of an ordinary citizen being elected – by the citizenry, no less! -- to the highest office in the land was strange, exotic, and unfamiliar. Of course it was an ideal, held by the humanists and Enlightenment figures who crafted the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, but it was nonetheless rare for all that. It was, if you will, aspirational – we hope it works, it ought to work, but there are no guarantees (as they freely admitted at the time – let's give them credit for that much). But in a sense they were going against something deeper and more ancient than philosophy. One might say that, despite all the idealism various philosophers can come up with, the “ghost in the machine” is human nature, which is much older than ideas.

A famous line of poetry from Robert Frost is: “Something there is that doesn't love a wall.” We might almost say, “something there is that doesn't love kings”. But on a deeper level, don't we still have reservations about the alternative to kings – that thing we call “democracy”? It's still, in some ways, new, scary, strange, and unsettling. Imagine people – ordinary people – being entitled to choose their ruler? “Ain't fittin'” to quote Mammy in “Gone With the Wind”. And why is this? Human nature being what it is, we naturally tend toward hierarchies, pecking orders, the ruler and the ruled; there is a certain security in knowing that someone's in charge, and that they were put there by... what? Divine right? Some unearthly power? Or simply because they were the biggest SOB in the valley, as the saying goes. In any case, it's the way we think that things were meant to be, and the way they ought to be. And I'm not talking about superficial politics, movements, or propaganda, but the way we are – the way our brains operate. (Anthropologists are fond of studying hierarchies in “primitive” tribes or “native” populations. How often do they find anything that can even remotely be described as a democracy – a council of tribal elders maybe, but the entire tribe having a voice? I would say that's as rare as... well... as democracy as an ideal (vs. the way it is currently defined by its advocates, which means having the “right” people in charge, and everyone else can... well, you know).)

One might say that democracy is an idea, a concept – an abstraction – apparently unattainable, ephemeral, and ambiguous in meaning, and this is why is means such radically different things to different people and groups. People project their own impulses, loves, hates, hopes, and dreams onto this entity called “democracy” in that hope that it will solve all of their problems. Kings (rulers), on the other hand, are solid and tangible. One says “king” with a fairly good idea (based on history if nothing else) of what kings do; the word has a clear meaning. But in these times it's unfashionable to come right out and say that one is in favor of kings, or rulers, or tyrants. So we have instead the spectacle of opposing sides both clamoring to “save democracy”, which really means to get, and keep, the government out of the hands of those other people (even if means corrupting the election process).

And when it comes to protestors of the BLM sort, or Antifa, or No Kings... I have observed elsewhere that an anarchist is only a totalitarian in disguise. And this has held true going back at least as far as the French, Russian, and Chinese revolutions. Our present-day home-grown revolutionaries want to “smash the state” (especially the Trump version), but they have plans – all sorts of plans – for what's supposed to replace it, and it won't have much to do with human rights, I guarantee. (What it will have everything to do with is them being in power.) One only has to see what happens when a far-left candidate wins an election for mayor or governor. The long knives come out in a New York minute (so to speak). But that's OK, since it's all about democracy, don'tcha know. If you wrap yourself in a flag labeled “democracy” you can pretty much get away with anything as long as the right people are willing to cooperate. (Among many ironies, that which is supposed to be majority rule turns out, more often than not, to be minority rule. Some even refer, on a regular basis, to our “ruling elite”, as opposed to elected officials who are assumed – and rightly so in most cases – to be mere tools of the unelected (and often anonymous) ruling elite. And then you have “shadow government” at all levels – think of intelligence agencies – who wield far more actual power than anyone who's out in the open.)

And even if democracy is an unknown ideal, there is a great variety of systems that are called democracies, mostly in order to disguise their real purpose, which is to tyrannize a populace while claiming their popular approval. Think of the fate of so-called democracies over the centuries. Many communist dictatorships were/are called “people's republics” or the “democratic people's republic of...” whatever. France killed its king in the name of liberty, equality, and fraternity, and wound up with an emperor. The “banana republics” alternate on a regular basis between “democracy” and military dictatorship. And on the home front, there is an ongoing debate as to whether we are a democracy or a republic, the problem being that representatives are elected by popular vote, which is actually a hybrid system. The citizenry do not get to vote, in a direct sense, on anything of consequence – only for other citizens who will, hopefully, represent their interests, but who wind up being all too human, i.e. corruptible, at times. (And the bigger government becomes, the greater are the incentives for compromise, deception, and outright corruption. Think about – oh, let's say a defense contractor that can bag a multi-billion dollar contract simply by donating a measly $100,000 to some politician's campaign fund. Talk about ROI!)

Now let's think for a moment about our own home-grown kings, or men who would be king. George Washington was actually offered a kingship, but turned it down. So far so good. But his election and inauguration were marked by celebrations, parades, fireworks, rituals, commemorative songs and artwork, and so on, all of which kind of makes one think of the sorts of things kings enjoy. (He was also given a palace – OK, a mansion – to live in.) So no, the taste for kings – for rulers – had not abated a bit simply because of the Revolutionary War and our victory over England. There was nothing wrong, it seems, with trading a king across the ocean for one right here at home.

Then we have the equally curious phenomenon of “presidential powers”. The president is supposed to execute and enforce laws passed by the legislature, right? (I wasn't sleeping all the way through eighth grade.) And yet, when it comes to war – armed conflict between the US and other countries – the president, as commander in chief, seems to have dictatorial powers.

Ah, but wait! – you might say. Only Congress has the power to declare war. Right? Very true. So... when's the last time Congress actually declared war? The answer is... 1942. So... what were all of these other wars we've fought since then? Well... some were what were euphemistically called “police actions”, some were based on United Nations Security Council Resolutions, some on “Joint Resolutions” or just “Resolutions”. This is the triumph of euphemism. If our troops are dying, and our resources are being squandered, it's a war, no matter what you call it.

But wait! Doesn't Congress have “the power of the purse”? Well... technically yes. But, #1, they can always be intimidated into releasing more funding for pretty much any war the president decides to engage in, especially if a negative vote would put their re-election chances in danger. And if not that, then we have what are called fungible resources. The president can divert funds from pretty much any government program into another, including the military. And besides, our national economy has been on a wartime footing since World War II. There was never a “peace dividend” – that's a myth. We have been prepared for war for over 80 years now. The troops have been in place, the weapons and ammunition were always on hand (and updated on a regular basis), the logistics were ready... all that was required was the green light from the White House. (The last war that took us any amount of time to “gear up” for was World War II. Lesson learned! Always be ready, because a war might start tomorrow.) (This is what the Pentagon calls “readiness”.)

Think about Trump's first term. He became a lame duck on his first day in office, thanks to the opposition (by Congress – including Republicans – and the Deep State), and “lawfare”, impeachments, hostile courts on every level (prior to his Supreme Court appointments), hostility and resistance from our “allies” as well as our “enemies”, and so on. The only thing he had any semblance of flexibility on was the military.

But he learned. During his second term (to date) he has been much more agile and aggressive in dealing with the courts, the Deep State (think DOGE), and Congress – and the “never Trumpers” in the Republican Party don't seem to have the clout they had the first time around. And he has also come to the realization that he can, basically, do anything he wants militarily, and no one can stop him. Wage (not declare) war on Iran? Nothing to it. So we have this completely baffling, and even bizarre, spectacle of a president who is constantly at war with the courts on the home front, but who can take out a very large country overseas single handedly, despite all the breast-beating, hand-wringing, hair-tearing, garment-rending, and protests by the opposition, Congress, the courts, the media, and late-night talk show hosts. He can be thwarted on the domestic front by a pipsqueak mayor or governor, or a judge looking for their 15 minutes of fame, but that's OK, because he can destroy a nation of 90-odd million people. Now tell me this makes sense on any level, and if there's any precedent for it in world history. And yet that is the system we have – or the system that what we started with in 1776 has evolved (devolved might be a better word) into.

And tell me also if there's anyone who really likes it this way, in their heart of hearts. If you say “no kings” then you're basically advocating total democracy, which is the rarest system on earth (assuming it's ever even been tried). If you're saying “no kings except the ones who do things that we like”, then you're advocating for part-time kings, or conditional kings, which are complete contradictions. What that amounts to is nothing more than mob rule.

Another bit of collective narcissism is the notion of being “on the right side of history” (implication: those other people are on the wrong side). Well... it kind of depends on what one defines as “history”. If you look at world history going as far back as any records exist, you have to conclude that, once again, pure democracy either never existed anywhere, or if it did it was little noted nor long remembered (thanks to Mr. Lincoln for that phrase). Iron-fisted rule was, well, the rule. So if one really wants to be on the winning side of history overall, one has to be all in for rulers – kings, in other words. But if one wants to be a “presentist”, or a futurist, or a dreamer of some sort, then current events and trends all have to be seen as pointing in the same direction – toward freedom, liberation, self-fulfillment, etc. – in other words, to Utopia. So to be “on the right side of history” you can simply ignore actual history and become delusional like the rest of the cool kids.

Plus – how will we ever know whether a given person, group, or movement is “on the right side of history” until they become... “history”? And who defines what “the right side” is? Just whoever won? (That's power in raw form. Nietzsche would approve.) And even so, many victories are far from permanent, and historical revisionism is going on all the time, sometimes based on newly-discovered documents but more often on political correctness.

The battlefields of history are littered with the corpses of people, groups, and movements that considered themselves cutting edge – vanguards – pioneers. The national socialists in Germany had delusions of grandeur, for sure – “the master race”, “the thousand-year reich”, etc. Well... it lasted all of 12 years. They thought they were on the right side of history, and many people agreed with them (in the U.S. and England, for example). The Bolsheviks thought they were on the right side of history – the “new Soviet man” and so on. And in that case, there are plenty of people around who think the Bolsheviks really were on the right side of history (you can find plenty of them in university political science departments). I suppose that communism had to somehow “evolve”, and continues to do so; it's certainly alive and well in their heads, and in the heads of large numbers of people filling our city streets with protests and marches.

All of this toying with semantics reminds me of that odd expression “reality-based foreign policy”, as if our foreign policy up to that point was based on something other than reality – which it may, in fact, have been. It would seem that a reality-based sense of history would indicate that we don't have to be pessimistic, but should not be Utopian in our thinking either. What's wrong with taking care of one problem at a time? “Sufficient unto the day are the troubles thereof” (Matthew 6:34)

But again, human nature is such that we want, crave, and seem to need a strong man (or woman) – someone who, when in charge, takes charge – with no apologies, lame excuses, or bogus appeals to “the will of the people”. After all, who are the “great men” of history, the heroes? The peacemakers? The ones who govern by committee? The ones who are obsessed with opinion polls? The ones who have to go begging to some legislature for everything? The ones who let themselves get beaten up by courts and judges?

The answer, obviously, is no. And the amazing thing is that even the greatest tyrants in history are still being celebrated somewhere, by someone – Napoleon, Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Mao... and who are considered our “greatest” presidents? In almost all the cases, they are “war presidents” – Lincoln, Wilson, FDR, Johnson, etc. – who exercised dictatorial powers on the war front, but whose powers also tended to bleed into the society in general (consider censorship as a prime example, not to mention the military draft and other niceties like internment camps).

So, is there a “bottom line” to all of this? It's obvious that most if not all of these No Kings protesters, “rights” advocates, and anarchists are hypocrites, whether they know it or not. The crave a “strong man” as much as anyone else does, only that said strong man has to be in their image and conform to their expectations. (I've said it before – they should study history and see what happened to the Old Bolsheviks, and many of the French revolutionaries, and those who dared to speak up against Mao. Be careful what you wish for. Revolutions may be energized by idealists, but they are eventually taken over by cynics.)

But, even given all of that, is our system chronically, if not fatally, flawed? Will be always be a sort of freak of nature – a republic pretending to be a democracy which wages war at will on anyone, anywhere on the planet (usually to “spread democracy”!)? It seems that these contradictions should long since have been fatal, and yet here we are 250 years after it all started. (The cynic (or realist) might say that democracy is an idea whose time hasn't yet come, and in fact never will.)

It almost seems as if the “American character”, however one defines it, has proven itself to be durable enough to survive these contradictions. At least so far. But it also seems that the tide of opposition is rising, and it's not just about getting rid of Donald Trump, although his presidency – his very presence – seems to be acting as an accelerant. If he were to somehow vanish tomorrow, the opposition would still be there. The rhetoric might have to be adjusted a bit, but the ideas would persist, as would the degree of energy behind them. And, as always happens throughout history, it's not so much a matter of numbers as of belief, energy, determination, and – more often than not – ruthlessness.

Whose Presidency Was It Anyway?

I'm not sure I understand what all the fuss is about when it comes to “Who was in charge?” during the Biden administration, given that Biden himself was clearly not in charge, or unable to be in charge (even if he was), or deluded into thinking he was in charge (even though he wasn't), etc. The point is that someone was, indeed, in charge – even if we don't yet know who it was, and may never know for certain. It's hard enough to run a White House with no one in charge, let alone the Executive Branch, let alone the entire country (which includes foreign policy). And even if we say, well, it was more like a committee, well then who called the meetings of said committee, and who was in charge of implementing whatever they came up with? There really is no escaping this question. The White House can't be like some federal agencies, in which – as far as I can tell – no one does anything. Someone has to be doing something at least some of the time. There is, after all, discernible output, even if, in Biden's case, it could be pretty thin at times.

So the good news is that someone was in charge, because someone had to be. Ever heard of an ocean liner sailing across the Atlantic with no one in charge? Or a jumbo jet flying across the Pacific with no one in charge? No. No way. Now... someone with an excellent memory might recall what happened when Stalin died. Nobody dared to step in and single-handedly take over. After all, who could possibly fill Uncle Joe's shoes? So they came up with a “troika” – a team of three, one of whom was Nikita Khrushchev. For a while there it seemed to work, but eventually Nikita came out on top and became the new face of Soviet Russia.

But compared to the Biden administration, the post-Stalin years were a model of transparency, the way the post-Soviet years were right out in the open for everyone to see. (Even the post-Mao years had more transparency than the so-called Biden White House.)

So the first question ought not to be “who was in charge?” but “does it even matter?” The Republic survived what many (especially overseas) might consider an interregnum. And not only that, but there was nothing unprecedented about it. Any number of commentators have pointed out similarities with Wilson (with Edith taking the reins from the failing Woodrow), and with FDR (rumor has it that Alger Hiss was the one in charge at Yalta, at least).

But let's drill down a bit more. Can anyone realistically claim that Jimmy Carter was fully in charge during his term in office? (He certainly served as a convenient scapegoat in countless ways.) Or how about Bush II? It's pretty much conventional wisdom that Dick Cheney was running the show. (They even made a movie about it.)

Consider this. Presidents have a staff. They have advisors. They have aides. But they don't all have “handlers” (I call them “keepers”) – you know, people who are in charge of damage control, which means to (1) try and keep the boss from committing blunders, or gaffes, or looking bad in public; and (2) cover for him when he still messes up, by making excuses which border on the ridiculous at times; and (3) telling the viewing public not to believe their lying eyes – that the boss didn't really do or say that, and it's all a conspiracy theory and a “cheap fake” and “hate”. And, BTW, enlisting the help of the compliant media in constructing an impenetrable wall of lies. All of these strategies were on full display on a daily basis during the Biden administration – and I nominate “Dr. Jill” as the handler-in-chief, but she must have had plenty of help.

So there's a continuum, in a way, as defined by how many “handlers” a given president has, and how often they are called upon to function. I would say that Biden, at this point, anchors the scale on the high end, but one also has to consider Carter, Clinton, and Bush II as being high on the “handler” scale. Even JFK is along there somewhere. (Trump, OTOH, doesn't seem to have any handlers – not even one! What you see is what you get, and there's no one off-camera wringing their hands and wondering how to “explain this one away”.)

And – not to imply that there's anything unique about presidents here – this also applies to vice presidents, presidential candidates, vice presidential candidates, and not a few assorted governors and mayors. Politicians climb to the heights with “a little help from their friends”. 'Twas ever thus. But then why go to all that trouble? Why not just work for a candidate, or official, who's not such a handful? Well... the plus side, if you will, is that weak-willed and incompetent people are easier to manipulate and direct, so if you're in charge of a “challenged” politician you can, with any luck, basically take over and direct said politician in the ways you would like him or her to go. And this, of course, is exactly what happened with Biden; someone recently quipped that his debilitation was “not a bug, but a feature”. (Implication – the people behind the scenes are smarter than the guy out front. True! An amazing percentage of the time. Can you imagine Bush II's “aides” being dumber than he was? Not a chance. They could have been president, but they didn't have the curb appeal.) (Ever notice how often these “aides” – when you see them on camera, which is rare – look like those high school geeks who couldn't get dates? So they compensate by being the power behind the throne. Not a bad gig, when you think about it – four years of job security and absolutely immune from any blame or responsibility.) (Kind of like pretty much any government job, truth be told.)

Now, let's admit that anyone who is president, no matter their level of intelligence or competence or energy, has an impossible job. If you read the Constitution, the job of president doesn't sound all that complicated or difficult; you basically have to have a modicum of wisdom and have the best interests of the American people at heart, and be a competent administrator. But, 200-plus years later, the job has turned into, #1, more of a kingship than a mere office, and #2, an all-powerful image of someone who can do anything, who puts Superman to shame, and who merits worship more suitable for a Roman deity. The problem here is that it sets an impossible standard, and raises expectations to stratospheric heights, with the result that any perceived failure is met with anger, indignation, and – too often – homicidal rage. When your god turns out to have feet of clay, he must die! So what motivates assassins is, at least in part, frustration – their victim was not perfect. He was tried and found wanting, so he has to go, and they're the one to make it happen.

A while back I put up blog posts which touched on the subject of Obama as The Chosen One, and that he subsequently became the kingmaker, brushing off all contenders for the nomination in 2016, including Joe Biden, in favor of Hillary Clinton. And when she was defeated for reasons yet to be determined, he remained in that role and, four years later, brushed off everyone except his vice president, namely Joe Biden. And when Joe Biden started to stumble (literally and figuratively), guess what, Obama stepped in once again and helped to engineer what has been described as a “coup” (a palace coup, at least), putting Uncle Joe out to pasture and putting Kamala up for election.

And lest we forget, there are many other ways this could have been accomplished. Biden could have been persuaded to retire prior to the election, which would have made Kamala the president, and increase her chances of winning in 2024 (not guaranteed, as witness Gerald Ford). Or, they could have left Biden on the ticket, let him win in 2024, and then persuaded him to quit, which would have made Kamala the president anyway. In a sense, the path they chose was the most risky one – get Biden to give up on being re-elected, but keep him in office, and declare Kamala the nominee without benefit of a primary, but force her to campaign to the best of her abilities with limited time. It kinda makes you wonder... why did they choose that route? It's mainly because Trump at that point was under siege, and everyone was convinced he'd be in jail by Election Day, which would sort of put a crimp in his chances of winning (even though he could, theoretically, have been elected while in jail – it's happened elsewhere in the world, and more than once). So with Trump on the defense on all fronts, Kamala seemed like a shoo-in.

But Trump fought back – and when you think about it, what does it take, after all, to make it big in New York City? And in real estate? You have to deal with regulations, corrupt politicians, the Mob, bankers, the media, the unions... it's basically impossible, and yet the tough somehow manage to survive. Now, given that, compared to New York City Washington D.C. is a much deeper cesspool of corruption and is a much bigger power center with a much larger entrenched bureaucracy, Trump's experience from his years in NYC paid off – first in 2016 and then again in 2024 (once he “wised up” about Washington, since he had underestimated it in 2016 and pretty much took office in 2017 as a lame duck).

But now, wait a minute! I said that Obama helped to engineer the “coup” that took Biden out of contention for 2024. People talk about Pelosi and Shumer, but no one mentions Obama.  "Ignore the man behind the curtain!"  So let's go back to 2017 when Trump takes office for the first time. What does Obama do? Does he retire, in the Bill Clinton mode? Does he go on book and lecture tours, or take a cushy job in academics or at a non-profit? No! He moves into a mansion in D.C., and... what? How many ex-presidents have taken up residence in Washington, D.C.? Only one, as I recall. But why? And why, despite all that, did we hear and see very little of him during Trump's first term? What was he doing all that time? Remember that he's an activist – a community organizer – a rabble-rouser. A true believer. Is he just going to fade away? Of course not.

My theory is that Obama was, during Trump's first term, running what is called The Deep State, i.e. the massive, unelected bureaucracy, and that their sole purpose during that period was to thwart, prevent, and sabotage if need be, any and all of Trump's initiatives and programs, which, let's admit, they pretty much did. Not only that, but they came right out in public and admitted it, for example in the impeachment hearings. It was their patriotic duty, after all. (So much for the Deep State being a “conspiracy theory” – they stood right up to be counted, with the cameras rolling.)

And it worked – or some will say that it worked, the proof being that Biden defeated Trump in 2020, whether legitimately or not matters little at this point. And Trump could have just gone back to his good life as a real estate tycoon, shaken the D.C. dust from his shoes, and pronounced a curse upon politics. And this is what everyone was hoping for – including, let's admit, most Republicans. The Never Trumpers became the Never Again Trumpers. And yet... after four years of “lawfare”, guess who won the nomination without even participating in any of the primary debates?

But let's get back to Obama for a moment. Let's say he really was running the Deep State all during Trump's first term – with the blessing of the Clintons, of course, who remain the true spiritual (if that is the word) leaders of the Democratic Party. So Biden takes office in 2021. Does Obama say “mission accomplished” and finally retire? Not a chance. Suddenly the Deep State becomes the state, and who better to stay in charge of it than Obama? (You think he'd trust Biden with anything that important? Or Kamala? Cue the laugh track.) And when the 2024 election loomed, the king maker became the king breaker (and the queen maker), calculating that the proper strategy was to get Biden to drop out of the race but not leave office until after the election. A risky strategy, as I said, but everyone on that side underestimated not only Trump's base, but the sophistication of his (and the Republicans') election watchdogs. (“We won't be fooled again.”)

So now we have, first, what I call Obama's third term, namely Trump's first term, followed by Obama's fourth term, namely Biden's first (and only) term. So... is it time for Obama to really and truly retire, at long last? Can he finally become history, rather than current events? Another way of putting it is that Obama, for all intents and purposes, served for four full terms – which beats FDR, who gave it a try but was rudely interrupted by his own demise. (Seem like there's something in the Constitution about all this, but like so many things in the Constitution it's pretty much either forgotten or ignored.) (And! If Kamala had won last November, we'd be at the start of Obama's fifth term! And here I thought only third-world countries had “presidents for life”.)

Now, of course, we have Trump trolling the media and the Democrats by talking about a third term for himself. Who knew you could have so much fun pretending to set fire to the Constitution? Frankly, if Trump was already thinking about the 2028 election, he wouldn't be on a search and destroy mission vis-a-vis the Deep State. As it is, he has nothing to lose, and even if he doesn't succeed in driving a stake through the heart of the Deep State, he's certainly put it on notice that it's not all-powerful, and has exposed its machinations through the efforts of the gnomes of DOGE.

So, boys and girls, the bottom line (for now) is that, yes, someone is always in charge. The world is too big and too complex for it to be otherwise. Plus, power has always been a great magnet (some would say aphrodisiac) for certain types of people. So that's not the question. The question is who, what's their agenda, and what's their strategy? And an even better question is simply this: Are you pleased with the results? No matter who was actually running things for Biden's four years in office, was the country, and world, better off at the end of his term than it had been at the start? That should be the sole criterion for any assessment of his presidency, even if he was no more than a propped-up figurehead. The verdict may not be against him, but it has to be against someone. Or for someone. You make the call.

The Long Game

 

The conventional wisdom among the conservative commentariat regarding Biden's open borders policy (which is, in effect, a no-borders policy) is that it's all about (1) adding more Democrat voters to the voter rolls; and (2) enjoying cheap, i.e. below union scale, labor. And this is certainly what it looks like on the surface. But consider this:

1. If it's all about jobs, why aren't there countless job recruiters setting up shop right at the border? I mean, even the least skilled immigrant can be taught how to operate a leaf blower in five minutes. Is it possible that our business sector sees the “new immigrants” as being either unemployable or potential troublemakers, and thus not worth the bother? (What happens when a guy who works at a chicken factory tries to break into an Army base?) Or have they just adopted a wait-and-see attitude? Let the government support these people for a few months, or a few years, then hire the cream of the crop.

2. If it's all about votes, then we have to consider the very real possibility that our electoral system is already deeply flawed and rife with corruption, and that it may not be long before the people in charge won't even bother counting votes any more. They'll just announce the winner, and anyone who objects will be threatened with jail time. (They'll be called “election deniers”.  Welcome to the Soviet Union!) So, basically, the notion of “more voters” doesn't really mean anything – or, very soon, won't.

So if it's not about jobs, or votes, what is it about? It's about changing America permanently – an idea that at least some of the aforementioned commentariat are willing to entertain. But if that's the case, how? And why?

One thing that comes to mind is simply that these immigrants are, by and large, totally ignorant of American history, and of the basic ideas, ideals, and premises on which this country was founded. And the few that might have some inkling of these things simply don't care. They come from places that are, typically, ruled by a single strongman, who has life-and-death power over his hapless subjects... and the pity is, they see this as the natural order of things. (And an argument can be made that this IS the natural order of things, if we allow history and anthropology to have any say in the matter. By the standard of world history, “democracy” and “republican government” are freakish, fragile, and an exception to the rule – not to mention a hopeful plea against fallen human nature.) Also, they are not “political refugees” or “seeking protection from persecution”, except in very rare instances. They're simply seeking their fortune, as the old saying goes – thinking they can get a better deal here than they could where they came from. And the thing is, they're absolutely right! – at least for now, in the short run. But they don't know anything about the long game. If they see America as the “gold mountain” they haven't yet encountered the wide moat that separates them from said mountain (and no, I don't mean the Rio Grande – this moat really is nearly impossible to get across, because it divides the haves from the have-nots (and the never-will-haves)).

Another way of putting this, as I've said in previous posts, is that as water seeks its own level, people also seek their own economic level – or the one to which they aspire – or at least one which is superior to the one they are turning their backs on. And who can blame them? If life in a shabby apartment with ten other people, and a leaf-blower job, is better (in their eyes) than life in Guinea, well, so be it. (Apparently they're also perfectly content with moving to a completely different culture, with a new language, strange customs, new rules, and new economic realities. Or if they wind up regretting their decision – well, let's put it this way – how many wind up wading back across the Rio Grande? I rest my case.)

But consider this. These people have already been exploited. They've been charged exorbitant fees by the cartels for their transportation to entry points. Many have been abused. Women have been raped. And yet they show up – show up, in fact, praising Joe Biden for being so kind and generous as to let them in. They will vote for him at the earliest opportunity! But, since they've been exploited already, won't at least some of them wake up to that fact and be waiting in fear of encountering some new form of exploitation? I think that's a pretty good bet. When you're accustomed to being a victim, victimhood becomes a part of your identity and your way of relating to the world.

And yet they will stay. By the thousands and millions. And will, in fact, remake the country, starting with the fact that they don't share any of our traditional values, ideas, and ideals – and customs – and sense of identity. But what is in store for them (and for the rest of us)? This is where the long game comes into play, and it's being played by the “usual suspects”, i.e. the ruling elite, who exert iron-fisted control over our government from the presidency on down, and over the mainstream media, and our academic institutions, and pretty much everything else right down to the grass roots (did I mention public schools and libraries?).

So, given that these are the people who are in charge, and they are perfectly content with the country having no functioning borders, what do they want? First, consider that they are promoting totalitarianism (call it Marxism if you like) on all fronts and with a thousand voices – with academics in the lead, followed closely by the mainstream media, “entertainment”, social media, and all other cultural trendsetters right down to the most local level. They have created a propaganda machine for this purpose that surpasses anything the Soviets or the Nazis ever came up with or even dreamed about, the idea being to have (as much as possible) a “bloodless revolution” where no one actually gets hurt, but the world is remade before our eyes, and there's nothing we can do about it. (And this process is not only well under way, but is getting very close to being complete. In other words, the “long march through the institutions” is nearly at an end.) (Exercise: Name me one institution of any significance that has not succumbed to the siren song of “wokeness”. I'm waiting... )

So where does uncontrolled and unlimited immigration come into this? For one thing, given that the new immigrants don't share our (traditional) “values”, they are unlikely to object to, or be disappointed with, pretty much anything the government (federal, state, local) does. In other words, they are “toughened up” vis-a-vis relations with authority. They know that the best strategy is to keep one's head down and stay out of the way. And if they can make $1 more per hour here than they could in Tajikistan, they're satisfied, and feel that it was worth the trouble. So they become, if you will, the new proletariat – the new working (or non-working) class, with the difference that they are satisfied with their lot. They may be exploited – slaves, for all intents and purposes – but they won't mind, because they refuse to believe they've made a horrible mistake by leaving their village in Botswana. (Cognitive dissonance triumphs again!)

So they become, by and large, the new lower class – the bottom level of the American pyramid. But wait! What happens to the people who have, up until now, been on the bottom? What happens to all of their claims... their “rights”... the victim status they have become so accustomed to, and even profited from in a way? At the very least, they will have to get used to sharing whatever it is they've enjoyed for many generations now with the newcomers. They are going to have to share that pie, which – by the way – is getting progressively smaller, thanks in no small part to the money the government keeps flushing down the toilet marked “foreign aid”. And what are they going to think about all of this? And will it matter? After all, the newcomers are the ones with all the benefits and preferences, and our traditional lower class is going to have make way (and they already are, in “sanctuary cities”). Any chance this is going start creating indignation, protests, and violence? (It's ironic that people will be fighting for privileged status on the bottom rung of society – but that's what we've come to at this point in our history.)

So when you let millions of newcomers in, it tends to dilute, in a way, the influence of those who are already here -- the “traditional” lower class. They find they're outnumbered, and no one has any more patience with their complaints, because there are all these new people to deal with, and they have rights too (more than the old lower class does, in fact).

But let's turn now to another familiar victim class – namely, the middle class. “Victim” you say? Well, consider that the middle class has, historically, been the declared enemy of most totalitarian movements, and the governments they succeed in taking over, going all the way back to the French Revolution. This is always the case with communism, and is an article of faith in Marxism. The erosion of the American middle class has been underway for a couple of generations now, and the primary tools used against it have been taxation and inflation (to which I will add the gobbling up, by multinational corporations, of small businesses and family farms, the economic and psychological mainstays of the middle class). And we also have to include the ongoing propaganda and social pressure against “bourgeois” values and “family values”, and “squares”, and “conformists”, and people who are selfish enough to want to hold on to their own hard-earned income. That's just “hate”, right? And to this one might add what I'll call cultural erosion – attacks on morals, values, even the arts, not to mention public education. The cards have been stacked against the American middle class, I would say, since the mid-60s, when everything changed.  (Heck, the middle class has even been shamed into not reproducing!  There's a long-term plan for you.)

But the main point when it comes to the middle class is that doctrinaire collectivists don't think the middle class is even necessary – that it's an encumbrance, and the sooner we get rid of the “bourgeoisie” the better. Now, as I've said on other occasions, find me a successful advanced society that didn't, or doesn't, have a middle class. Soviet Russia had a kind of pseudo-middle class, consisting of government employees, who were, arguably, better off in some ways than the hapless peasants or the factory workers – but economically, they weren't much better off; they still had to stand in line for bread for hours each day. China under Mao did its best to eliminate its middle class (such as it was), but it came back with a vengeance when Mao's successors decided to give capitalism a try – you know, just a little bit – just a smidgen – and now they have more billionaires than the rest of the world combined, and are making major inroads into the American economy. And a new middle class has been created out of, basically, nothing, in order to keep the machine running. It's housed in countless high-rise apartment complexes in the large cities, while the countryside stands deserted.

And speaking of China – it's been noted that a considerable number of “new immigrants” (formerly “illegal immigrants”) are, in fact, Chinese – and overwhelmingly men of military age. Now think about it. China is, unlike us, serious about its borders. It's tough to get in, and it's tough to get out – and you can bet than any Chinese citizen who leaves the Middle Kingdom for any reason needs (1) permission to leave, and (2) permission to go wherever they're going, and (3) they must have a purpose (or maybe a mission) in mind. So these guys are all here with their government's permission and blessing. And what is their mission? Who knows? One thing you can bet on, they won't be walking around with leaf blowers or flipping burgers.

But this is all realism – so annoying! – and it doesn't faze the idealists, those who dream of a “classless society”, which really means a vast army of slaves, but with them in charge. This is their dream – their ideal – that which they live for, and they have said as much, right out in public, in confabs like Davos (“You'll own nothing, and you'll like it.”). It's the ultimate goal of our ruling elite – continue to peck away at the middle class until it ceases to exist for all intents and purposes, and at the same time populate the lower class with countless new immigrants who, let's say, don't believe in “ideas” any further than their own immediate material well-being. And they will, in fact, be slaves – but happy, or at least not violently malcontented. (Drugs enter in here, as part of the plan – any relation to legalization of marijuana, maybe? Therapeutic psychedelics? Think “soma” as in Aldous Huxley's “Brave New World”.) And the Soviet Union is the best model for this. They had a ruling elite, government and business had merged and become one body, and everyone else was a worker bee.

Wait a minute! Doesn't that pretty much describe this country right now? Pretty much, except, again, for that pesky middle class which, among other things, believes in “American” values and ideals, and which – even more annoyingly! – persists in listening to Donald Trump. (Note that I consider “working class” people with steady jobs and decent incomes to be, for all intents and purposes, middle class, especially since white-collar salaries overlap, to a considerable degree, the incomes of skilled labor. Another way of putting it is that middle class people, regardless of occupation, are taxpayers, and lower class people are tax receivers.) And when Trump says “They're not after me, they're after you; I'm just in the way”, he is absolutely right. And if their hero should fall in defeat, that will be the end of the last, best hope for the real middle class – those who “cling” to traditional American values. All that will be left is policing up the battlefield, which the elite and its forces have already shown exemplary skill at (witness the January 6 prosecutions).

But hold on! Our conservative commentariat (them again!) are fond of saying that the “classless society” is an illusion, and an impossible dream... and that any attempts to create one have ended in catastrophe. Well... it depends on one's point of view. The Soviet Union lasted for 70-plus years, with all of its programs and its organizational structure remaining intact the entire time. And it was not terminated by means of revolution or conquest. In fact, American liberals are still mourning the demise of the USSR, and contend that it wouldn't have ended “if we'd just given it a chance”. (Seventy-plus years?? I'd say we gave it every possible chance.) And as for China, after the economic and social catastrophe under Mao, more sober heads prevailed, and what we have now is an awake (not woke, note) monster that is making daily inroads into our own economy and well as academics and social media.

So I guess, in a sense, totalitarianism, or collectivism, or communism, is a stage of development that a society can eventually grow out of – call it an adolescent tantrum, if you will. But the economic and social costs, not to mention the death toll, makes one wonder, couldn't they have just skipped that phase, and evolved in a different way? Why did Russia and the Iron Curtain countries have to endure all those years, and decades? But that would be to discount the revolutionary spirit which seems to be built into the human DNA – that, and the tendency for a new ruling elite to rise up and lay claim to the revolution and its results – or, in our case, for the ruling elite to actually create the revolution, in a top-down fashion, the way Mao's “Great Leap Forward” and “continuous revolution” were top-down phenomena. (Consider how the sporadic outbreaks of urban violence and rioting in the U.S. all seem to originate with wealthy sponsors, members of the ruling elite who have taken it upon themselves to take charge of the bottom-up dirty work while someone else takes on the top-down stuff, like elections for instance.)

But still, given the poor track record of totalitarian governments, you'd think our ruling elite would come up with something else – a third way, or something. But that would violate their most basic premise – that only they are worthy to rule, only they are wise, and only they have the will power to bring the fractious citizenry (AKA deplorables) under control. So they have to give it another try, because who knows, this time it might work! At least that's what the grizzled, dog-eared doctrinaire collectivists in Ivy League faculty lounges think. It will work, because it has to work. There is no other possibility. And no price is too high to pay for making it work by any and all means.

So... now we have the spectacle of another presidential race, with the entire apparatus of the federal government (and many state and local governments) lined up against one man, namely the former and would-be future president. When you consider what's at stake, and the odds, it seems impossible that he could actually win in November, even assuming we have an honest election. (As was said about an American politician some decades back, nobody likes him but the people.) And is Trump a perfect person? Heck, no. But he has become an unlikely hero – the last hope for a considerable portion of the population. Once he vanishes from the scene, who will be left to fend off the vultures? Some may try, but they won't have Trump's charisma, determination, or courage (or money). All they will have is their beliefs, their ideals, and their traditions, and it's hard to imagine those will suffice to withstand the onslaught. But time will tell.

Why are the Democrats Supporting Nikki Haley and not Trump?

Question du jour – why are the Democrats (which includes the mainstream media) supporting Nikki Haley? I mean, they expect to win in November, right?  So why do they care who the Republican nominee is? Some of it can be attributed to TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrome), which will always be with us... and of course they don't want Trump to have the “honor” of being nominated (for the 3^rd time) by the Republicans, even though they fear and despise the “MAGA terrorists”, i.e. Trump supporters within the Republican party (and those not in the party as well).

It's clear that they aren't playing the long game here. They're getting their jollies by piling on Trump and whoever consents to be his running mate (“I pity the fool...”), but think about this. If Haley winds up being the nominee – and the Dems are doing everything in their power to make certain that Trump can't be nominated – and then loses, the Republican party will survive (if only in the usual minority status). That is, the mainstream Republicans – the “acceptable opposition”, the ones who are always happy to “cross the aisle” and be second-class citizens to the Dems – will take over once and for all, with Trump and the MAGA crowd finally sent into exile and relegated to the ash heap of history.

That would be a perfectly acceptable outcome for the Democrats. Having the Republicans as a perpetual and obseqious minority – which they have been for much of the time in recent years – would feel like business as usual, and the so-called two-party system would survive, at least in theory.

But the Democrats don't want a two-party system – not really. In their heart of hearts, they want a one-party system on the Soviet model, i.e. no opposition at all, not even the acceptable kind. Nothing but unanimous votes in Congress (and eventually one TV network, one radio network, one newspaper (OK, the Soviets had 2)... not to mention, no elections!). So what is the best way to make this happen, or at least to get a head start? It would be to throw Haley under the bus and allow the Republicans to nominate Trump, and then see to it that he loses, at which point the Republicans (meaning all of them, even including the RINOs) could be declared dead and buried along with their MAGA minority.

Now, you might say that Trump and the Republicans lost in 2020, but recovered – and this in spite of the fact that he was the sitting president at the time, and it's rare for a sitting president to be defeated for a second term. But the Democrats and their allies in the media and elsewhere will, by November, have had 4 more years to not only continue to brand Trump as Hitler Incarnate, but also to brand his followers as terrorists and put many of them in jail (and him as well, perhaps) – this process being well under way right now, and proceeding at warp speed. “Our very democracy is at stake!” – cry the mainstream media with one voice.

So the contrasts are much more stark now than in 2020 or 2016 – and this is mainly because the Democrats and the media have declared this to be the case. So the strategy of supporting Haley makes sense in the short run, but in the long run the Dems would be better off if Trump ran again and lost, because from then on the Republicans would be required to hang their heads in shame (for “putting us through this again”) and be paraded around wearing dunce caps by the Red Guard, and be reduced to a bunch of vaporous ghosts (think of 100 Mitch McConnells) wandering aimlessly around Washington while the Democrats establish a people's republic.

(PS – the Dems show no signs of wanting to push Biden aside (or Harris either), despite rumors to that effect. A president who is content to follow orders and read, even if haltingly, from scripts, and a vice president who is satisfied with a portfolio of sinecures, is exactly what they want; it has worked for three years, and it will work for one plus four more.)

(And BTW, Nikki Haley is playing her own game here. She's staying in the race, at least in part (in my opinion) because she expects the Dems/media/courts to take Trump out well before the election, at which point she'll be the last, um, person standing. That's the short game. The medium game would be for her to save a lot of time and money by dropping out now – or at least appearing to – and then wait for Trump to be neutralized, at which point she can come back on stage and save the day like Mighty Mouse.)

It's going to be very interesting to see how these various games intersect over the next few months. In fact, the mainstream (non-MAGA) Republicans may even decide to nominate Trump (assuming he hasn't been disqualified) for the same reason that the Dems would favor this – to insure his defeat, and thus the resounding defeat of the MAGA wing, thus leaving the mainstream unchallenged in their slouch toward obscurity. I'm not sure if they're capable of this kind of subtlety – they are called “the stupid party”, after all – but it would certainly win them friends on the other side – or let's say enemies disguised as friends.

2024 -- Another annus horribilis?

2024 is looming, like one of those hurricanes out in the Atlantic that's not yet causing much damage, but just wait until it reaches land! I don't want to be just another alarmist (the field is much too crowded already), but I'm afraid that the Republican convention next year may make the Democratic convention of 1968 look like a tea party. (And the Republicans won't have a Mayor Daley to back them up – and I can't imagine the Milwaukee police department will be much help, since they've probably fallen prey to defunding and other forms of demoralizing and neutering.)

This is, of course, predicated on (1) Trump not being in jail at that point; (2) Trump still being in the race (or, Trump being in jail but still being in the race – hey, it could happen!); (3) The mainstream Republicans not having succeeded in keeping him out of the primaries; and (4) The mainstream Republicans accepting primary results that favor Trump, rather than declaring them null and void and going to a caucus, AKA “smoke-filled room”, system.

Note that the Colorado Supreme Court has already barred Trump from both the primaries and the general election, and they are likely to be followed by many other state supreme courts across the land – and in the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, etc. (How exciting it is to keep an ex-president from running for president!  And just about anyone can play!) – but especially in states with high population levels (all you need is the West Coast and the Northeast). While Trump's base is justifiably outraged by this – as are a handful of commentators on Fox News – the Republican mainstream is strangely silent on the matter. Perhaps it's because they're glad to have someone else do the dirty work for them so they won't get in trouble with Trump's base, and/or they see it as an example of how easy it is to keep someone out of the primaries, as in “Hey, why didn't we think of that?” (Actually, they did, when it came to Ron Paul.) (OTOH, RFK Jr. has been subjected to a total media blackout, probably because, like Ron Paul, he has a lot of good ideas. But they can't make fun of him because of the family name – unlike Ross Perot, who at least had amusing ears.) To put it another way – I suspect that much of the Republican mainstream is secretly celebrating this, oblivious to the fact that if it can happen to Trump it can happen to any of them as well.

You can see the run-up increasing in intensity on a daily basis, primarily in the mainstream media but also in statements by Biden lackeys, certain academicians, certain “entertainers”... all reading from the same sheet of talking points, of which #1 is always “Trump is Hitler” (not “will be Hitler”, note, but he's already Hitler, in some kind of mysterious reincarnation phenomenon). The Ministry of Propaganda aside, what the Fox News folks call “lawfare” is also well underway, and is merely a seamless continuation of the impeachments while Trump was in office – with many of the same people calling the shots as during Trump's administration. Of course the “bloody shirt” that is constantly waved in the air is January 6 – a date that will live in infamy! – but it's far from the only weapon in their arsenal (heck, even the Russia collusion hoax is still alive and well in the fever dreams of many of them).

But behind it all – the thinly-concealed threat, if you will – is the very real possibility that the troops are already being organized to show up in force at primaries and at the convention – and yes, I mean the same folks who did all the burning and pillaging and vandalism back in 2020 (and who continue to do so at selected locations just to keep in practice). And this goes way beyond the time-honored “rent-a-mob” technique on the local level (often, depending on the issue, with Jesse Jackson and/or Al Sharpton parachuting in to add spice to the mix).  As in 2020, these so-called anarchists (totalitarians in disguise, I mean) will arrive from all over the country, brought in by plane, train, bus, and automobile, and with pockets full of cash from their billionaire sponsors, who – recalling a phrase from the war in Vietnam – believe that it's necessary to destroy the country in order to save it.

So what it really amounts to is a protection racket of sorts (remember the “long hot summer” threats of times past?). Keep Trump on the primary ballots and this is what will happen – and just try nominating him and putting him on the national ballot! Cities will burn! And the mainstream Republicans, ever the gentlemen (and gentlewomen), will, I expect, bow to mob rule and disown that troublemaker – i.e. Trump – once and for all, rather than just being passive-aggressive about it the way they were during his administration. And we'll wind up with some garden-variety neocon who won't ruffle the Democrats' feathers – Nikki Haley* being in the lead for that role at this point (and please note she's getting support from some Democrats simply for being the anti-Trump). And then, in turn, if the Republicans come up with another uninspiring, ho-hum candidate, that person will lose the election to Uncle Joe or whoever the Democrats have called up from the bench to replace him. (And – highly likely – the Trump base will simply sit out the election as a form of protest, thus giving Uncle Joe even more of a mandate than he would have had otherwise.)

So – bottom line – the protection racket will have worked. And no, it's not democracy or even a pale semblance thereof; it's strictly mob rule of the kind that can be found in many “banana republics” and other pseudo-democracies across the globe. But if this is what we've come to, well... some will call it karma, others will say it's the way empires decline and fall, and many of the citizenry – thoroughly demoralized already -- will just shrug and say (or think) “Eh, what do you expect?” Faith in government, anyone? I'm afraid that's already extinct at this point. Rule of law? The Colorado Supreme Court certainly doesn't have any use for it. There's just enough residual faith for some people to think that voting might actually make a difference; the rest of us are either cynical, or pessimistic, or just plain realistic – and if you can tell me the difference these days, please let me know.

* This just in – she failed to denounce slavery! Looks like the establishment has already administered the kill shot.

Trump 2.0? Eh... not likely

OK folks, time for a reality check. Trump says he's running for president in 2024. Fine. Presumably he'll be running as a Republican. Fine. (I guess he could run as an independent – he might even get on the ticket!) But consider a few of the hurdles he will have to face. He can stage all the rallies he wants, but when it comes to “debates”, guess what – it's the party that decides who gets to participate, and the Republicans could simply refuse to let him in the door. That's number one. Then we have the primaries. Did you know that there is no requirement for primaries? It's not in the Constitution, or anywhere else. The party can decide to have a primary, or it can just skip primaries altogether and go right to the convention. Then there's the small matter of convention delegates and how they're selected. The state committees can simply refuse to send any pro-Trump delegates. And then, in the wildly improbable likelihood that Trump wins a plurality of votes in the convention, they can simply be declared null and void, and the convention can become “brokered” (formerly known as “the smoke-filled room”).

Now this, of course, is all predicated on the premise that high-ranking Republicans have... um... you know, those particular masculine anatomical parts, which they have demonstrated, over and over again, that they do not possess. But really now – does anyone actually expect Orange Man to rise again from the depths, like Godzilla, and take over the Republican Party again? Or for them to allow it to happen? This is, of course, the recurring nightmare of the Republican mainstream – not of the Democrats, note, despite all their wailing! They know it's a lost cause, but it's more fun to pretend it's not. (They've gotten so used to running the Fear Machine that they can't resist using it on themselves.) So all of the hand waving, running in circles, and nervous breakdowns in both parties are no more than theater (but if it keeps the MSM busy for 2 years that could be a good thing). The Republicans have had enough of show biz. They'll nominate some gray nonentity who will be certain to lose to Joe Biden (even if the latter is ruling from an oxygen tent at that point), and thus be able to return to their comfort zone of powerlessness.

(But – BTW – don't think that BLM and Antifa are going to take this sitting down. They are primed and ready for the next fight. Expect them to show up in force at any Trump event until this quixotic candidacy is terminated, either voluntarily or by force.)

Don't Even Think About Running for President in 2024 (if you're a Republican)

 

The conventional wisdom among the conservative commentariat is that Trump and his family, and various members of his administration, are being hounded by the government (at all levels – federal, state (NY and Florida), and local (NYC)) in order to insure that he doesn't run for president in 2024. With all due respect, I disagree, and here's why.

#1, he'd be out of his mind to run (even assuming he's not in jail by that time, or some law or Constitutional amendment hasn't been dredged up to render him disqualified) given the treatment he received the last time around – from the day of his announcement through the campaign, and though his entire time in office, and even afterwards up to the present day. (I made some related comments in a blog post, “4 More Years? Really??”, July 28, 2020.) Trump may have some less-than-stellar personality traits, but I don't think masochism is one of them.

#2, if Biden managed to win against Trump in 2020, he can win against him again in 2024. Period! Or – whoever the DNC chooses to replace Biden can win likewise. The counterargument is that Biden (or whoever) would, in 2024, be running not only against Trump but against his (Biden's) own record during his first term – which, to the same commentariat, is considered dismal, to put it mildly. The problem there is that Biden has not lost a bit of support, either politically or among the electorate, since his inauguration. His fan club in the mainstream media are unstinting in their support and in running interference for him, and have yet to publish, or broadcast, any “news” which would be detrimental to him or his administration. (If Reagan was the “Teflon president”, then Biden is the “new improved Teflon president”. Not only does nothing stick, nothing even gets close.) To put it another way, Biden is a roaring success at this point, going from one victory to another – and as long as the faithful continue to believe this, he's good to go for 2024. (And it's hard to imagine anything that could cause the faithful not to keep believing. I mean, if a simple comparison of the way things are now with the way they were in January 2021 isn't sufficient, then nothing is.)

#3, even if Trump returned from political Siberia and staged a comeback not unlike that of Napoleon when he returned from Elba, would he attract any support outside of his hard-core MAGA constituency – the ones who attend his rallies? My sense is that his former supporters among the Republican mainstream have suffered enough – they have a chronic case of “Trump fatigue” that will not be eradicated. (And this is not Trump's fault, by the way – it's just that they're tired of the endless domestic warfare that Trump's being in the White House led to and sustained for more than four years.) (Call Trump fatigue the flip side of Trump Derangement Syndrome, if you like – both very much with us, especially now that the latter is official government policy.) And if his erstwhile supporters among Republicans are demoralized and worn out, imagine where the “independents” who voted for him in 2016 stand; they don't even have any party loyalty to hold them together. They were the first to jump ship, and are nowhere to be found at this point.

So, bottom line, the Democrats have nothing whatsoever to fear from Trump in 2024, and I think they know it. If he should dare to run, they could run the proverbial yellow dog against him and the dog would win. So it's not about Trump at all, is it? At least not in terms of the election of 2024. So if it's not about him, what is it about, other than playing to the paranoiac crowd?

There are two factors motivating the War on All Things Trump. One is simple vengeance. Trump deserves to be punished severely, and in perpetuity, for even having run for president and – even worse – for having won, and – even worse – for managing to stay in office for a full four-year term, despite two, count 'em, two impeachments – not to mention being accused of treason and being Putin's lapdog, along with countless other crimes. Lest we forget, his candidacy started out as a joke (to the media), and no one except Anne Coulter took it seriously – at least in public – until the morning after Election Day, when the sky fell and the pillars of the temple crumbled to dust. Privately, of course, the counter-candidacy drive was on from day one, with various elements of the Obama administration taking a leading role.

And then there was the humiliation of Hillary Clinton, Empress-in-Waiting, who never hurt a fly and in no wise deserved such shabby treatment as to be defeated by this big orange guy from New York City (just down the road from Chappaqua, to add to the insult).

And then there was the fact that, once in office, he tried to run the government like a business, and actually make changes that were more than merely cosmetic. And this, of course, was a wake-up call for the bureaucracy, AKA the Deep State, which marshaled its forces in an all-out effort to thwart, neutralize, or at the very least ignore his every initiative – with signal success, I might add. But the fact that he didn't back down – no “walking back”, “clarifying”, or “reconsidering” with this guy -- caused the derangement to boil over into public view (the impeachment hearings providing a prime example, where one petty bureaucrat after another got up and said that they considered it their patriotic duty as Americans to sabotage any Trump programs).

So yes – for breaking all the rules, and never apologizing, Trump deserves all he's getting, and more. And clearly the “numbers” didn't count, i.e. the various measures of the success of his initiatives which continued to mount up, and which the mainstream media and the Democrats could only answer either with “It's a lie” or “It doesn't matter”. (Although it's funny how Biden and his minions spout the same sorts of numbers every day, and we're all expected to believe them without question.)

That's the punishment-vengeance-vendetta piece, perfectly understandable in this day and age. America at its finest! An entire administration devoted to one thing, the punishment of the previous administration. Can you say “banana republic”, class?

The second factor is, if you will, less emotional and more strategic, and that's to show anyone foolish enough to consider running for president on the Republican ticket in 2024 what will happen to them if they go through with it. Well, number one, they won't win for many of the same reasons Trump couldn't win, even if they are identified as never-Trumpers, anti-MAGA hatters... untouched by the outrages of the Trump “era”... pure as the driven snow. For one thing, the Democrats are the majority party now at the federal level at least, and it's delusional to think otherwise. So a Republican with all the finest anti-Trump credentials – let's say a reincarnation of John McCain – and not festooned with Trump cooties – has very little chance, because they will inevitably be lumped in with Trump anyway and called his clone, or Trump 2.0, or some such. (Plus, the chances are that their kids' nanny's brother-in-law once changed the oil in one of Trump's cars, and that is sufficient evidence to find the hapless candidate guilty as charged.) (This is no exaggeration. It's the way things operated on a daily basis in the Soviet Union, and in Mao's China.)

Now – one could ask – if the Democrats are sure-fire winners in 2024, why bother to intimidate the Republicans into... maybe even giving up and not running at all? If the Republicans managed to bring Abraham Lincoln back to life and put him up as a candidate, might they not stand a chance? Well, let's just call it “insurance”. The fact that the Democrats have an iron grip on the voting process (polls, machines, ballots, counts, novel voting procedures, and so on) in many states and in all major cities might have swung an election, or more than one, in the past. Nowadays it would be seen as redundant – a case of “overkill”, if you will. But the mechanisms are in place, and they have to be kept up to snuff – after all, there are state and local elections to think about, not to mention elections for Congressional seats. Besides, the intimidation factor trickles down to the state and local level; political correctness is now the law of the land, and there is no elective office so trivial or obscure that it will escape the attention of the PC police if anyone tries wandering off the reservation. (And, lest we forget, the sacred duty of any true believer in totalitarianism is not just to defeat those who disagree, but to exterminate the disagreement. This is right out of “1984” and is as true today as it ever was.)

So, bottom line-wise, who in their right mind would want to put themselves and their family through all that? The mainstream media have tasted blood, and they're unlikely to cover their fangs for any future Republican – not even for the ilk of Liz Cheney, a sheep in wolves' clothing who is more anti-Trump than most Democrats.

So basically, you can count anyone who proposes running on the Republican ticket in 2024 as (1) delusional, (2) masochistic, and (3) ready for the funny farm. But this doesn't mean plenty won't try, since those qualities seem to typify Republican politicians these days.

So now we know what's really behind the new, improved witch hunt being staged against Trump and anyone who had even the slightest, most trivial connection with him. (Note that not only his lawyers are being called up before Congressional committees, but their lawyers, and their lawyers. Before long half the legal profession will be headed for federal prison (and come to think of it, that might actually be regarded as a good thing).)

Then, given all of the above, why is the conservative commentariat insisting that it's all about keeping Trump from running in 2024? I think it's basically about denial. In their world, the following propositions actually have some truth value:

1. Trump could win if he ran in 2024.

2. Some other Republican could win in 2024 if Trump chose not to run or was prevented from running.

3. The Republican Party represents the majority opinion among the American citizenry.

4. Biden's record will count against him in 2024.

5. Trump is still, in some mysterious way, the leader of the Republican Party (in this, at least, they agree with the mainstream media).

6. The Republican Party has a future on the national level.

Did I say “denial”? “Delusional” is more like it. Also “smoking their socks”. And so on. My expectation for 2024 is very simple: If Biden should choose not to run, what are the Democrats going to do about Kamala Harris? (Who? – you ask. Precisely my point. This should be TV worth watching; the rest is drearily predictable.)