Over the last four years, since the start of the primaries, I must have said it at least a hundred times, “Donald Trump us the gift that just keeps on giving.” Normally when I wrote that, I was referring to giving me comedic grist to lambaste him with, but also for giving Democrats fodder for their cannons. But this shit is getting ridiculous. If Trump keeps this up, pretty soon the Democrats and us comics are going to have to start paying an inheritance tax.
As His Lowness has degenerated, the question has slowly turned from “How low can he go?” to “How low can the GOP go?” SO far, that question has been like trying to find the edge of the universe, but just seems to stretch on into infinity. But in the last 72 hours, Trump has pushed the envelope three separate times, and any one, or all of them, may finally end up being that fabled bridge too far, especially with Trump’s polling looking to drag down GOP chances in several key Senate states as well as the electoral college.
The first is Trump’s decision to pull $150 million plus from FEMA’s disaster relief fund to DHS to increase immigrant housing and immigration court capacity. Tropical storm Dorian will hit Puerto Rico today. We all know that Trump could give a shit less about Puerto Rico. But what happens after that? Depending on the track, it could hit either Florida, Georgia, or the Carolinas as a category 3 hurricane. All of which appear to be becoming serious battleground states in 2020, thanks to the adventures of Il Douche.
What happens if one or more of those states get slammed, and the money runs short? Why, Trump is going to go running to congress for additional funding for FEMA of course. And Nancy Pelosi’s immediate reply? “Fuck you, and the horse you rode in on, Charlie Brown! You restore that funding we gave you from DHS to FEMA, and we’ll see what happens next.” What can the GOP in congress say? They can’t accuse the Democrats of playing politics with peoples lives, because the Democrats simply respond that they already gave the money to FEMA, and Trump absconded it for his war on refugees. The Democrats can even steal the Republicans thunder by immediately promising an additional $100 million or whatever, just as soon as the missing funds are restored from DHS to FEMA. What can the Republicans say?
Second, we have Trump’s decision to hold the G-7 summit nest year at his Bedbug Palace Doral resort. Forget Putin for the moment, this isn’t just an emoluments violation, it’s a clear cut extortion racket. Trump is telling the rest of the G-7, “Hey, nice little summit you have there. Be a pity if anything happened to it.” This is the sitting President of the United States forcing foreign governments to pay baksheesh to attend their own conference!
And as far as the emoluments clause goes, I find it hard to believe that any court would say that as a co-equal branch of government, with oversight duties, the U.S. House doesn’t have legitimate standing to bring a suit to stop the event from taking place at Doral. How do GOP incumbents in either chamber defend Trump if/when a restraining order is slapped on the event until it’s hashed out in court?
Worse yet what happens when either Putin, paying extortion to Trump, or a combination of the two has G-7 member nations deciding to cancel attending the conference? Putin would love nothing more than to see the G-7 fall apart, with or without him in it. Senate failed impeachment or not, we will be right in the middle of the general election cycle. The Democrats will play Trump’s circle jerk bromance with Putin night and day, and how does the GOP counter that to the electorate?
And batting clean up, today’s reporting that Trump has told subordinates that he will pardon them for any illegal actions they undertake to expedite the building of his border wall, up to and including violating rights of eminent domain. Sweet Jesus, where do I even start with this one?!?
Look, let’s forget the fact that any preemptive pardons that The $1 Store Caligula might issue would be immediately challenged in court in 2021 by a Democratic DOJ, and almost certainly overturned in court as an abuse of the pardon power, leading to charges. John Roberts would never allow his legacy to be that he was the Chief Justice that made the President an Emperor. And forget the facts that if Trump doesn’t preemptively pardon them and loses, they get prosecuted, or that court challenges under eminent domain will stop construction for years while it’s fought out in court.
The President of the United States has just ordered subordinates to perform illegal activities foe which he will ensure that they are not punished. Fuck me! This makes Watergate look like a parking ticket! Even Nixon didn’t have the stones to pardon the Watergate burglars, he just paid their legal fees. And Haldeman, Ehrlichman, Dean et.al.went to prison. Trump just handed the Democrats a solid gold shillelagh. From now until election day, Democrats can hammer every GOP incumbent to respond on the record about their sitting president authorizing illegal activity to accomplish something that congress failed to authorize. And the answer is?
The old saying is, You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink. As it stands right now, Trump has the GOP’s nose jammed down into the trough, and they have two choices. They can either drown voluntarily, or they can kick him in the balls and gasp for breath. But at this point, even option two may not save the horse.
I was expecting you to include the administration’s decision to cancel the visa’s of patients and their families here for treatment of life-threatening medical conditions. I can’t think of any interest group, constituency or voting block that benefits from that move. There is no conceivable threat to America posed by allowing these medical procedures. It simply shows that there is no depth of cruelty to which this administration won’t be found wallowing as long as they stay in power.
It’s even hard to see how the ‘cruelty is a feature, not a bug’ comment could apply.
How can even Nazis condone such mindless cruelty?
It’s only a “feature” to those as fucked up in the head as Trump and Miller, which is one of the things that’s giving the larger GOP such cardiac kittens…
I wanted to wait to do that until the steam stopped coming out of my ears, and I could devote it to an article of its own… *Spoiler Alert* That article should e up sometime in the morning…