You well remember waking up on 11/09, if you went to sleep at all, and finding yourself down the rabbit hole with the rest of us. The election of Donald Trump knocked the political world off its axis and nothing has been the same. Night became day, black is white, up is down. So it should come as no shock to you that in contravention of the laws of political physics, Trump seeks a second term and of course he doesn’t have any plan or policy to share with us. Why would he? This is all about staying out of jail and staying on TV. Trump has an ego the size of a gas-giant planet and this is all about juicing that ego. He didn’t run for the job, he ran for the attention. He hates the freaking job. Windsor Mann, The Bulwark:
Trump is not interested in the actual job of the presidency. He’s interested in the attention the presidency affords him.
After his election, he discovered that running for president was easier and more fun than being president. Which is why he continued to hold campaign rallies even after he was elected. He wasn’t campaigning for anything. He just liked hearing crowds screaming his name. Unlike most politicians, who campaign in order to govern, Trump campaigns as a way to avoid governing. […]
Instead of holding rallies for the purpose of getting elected, Trump wants to get elected so he can keep having rallies. […]
Trump cares more about his Twitter account than people’s lives. It took him months to respond to the pandemic and a few weeks to be bored by it. Yet, two days after Twitter flagged two of his tweets, Trump signed an executive order targeting social media companies and said he would shut down Twitter if he could.
Instead of using Twitter to advance his political agenda, Trump uses the presidency to advance his Twitter agenda.
And don’t believe that he’s going to resign. Not unless Vladimir signs off on it, and I wouldn’t make book on that. No, he’s going down in flames via the same media that got him where he got in the first place. Except the second time around is a whole lot different than the first. Right now Trump is depending on the base, Diamond and Silk, and the big brain on Brad Parscale and his Death Star to bring the bacon home. Rick Wilson, Daily Beast:
Trump’s 2016 effort could afford to be a shambolic circus; nothing was on the line. He never expected to win and so the rotating cast of campaign managers didn’t really matter. Now, the fear is rising that the bet on a base-only election isn’t playing out.
For Jared and Brad, the vultures are circling the Trump effort, from Karl Rove and his merry band to the Ike Turner of Trump world, Corey Lewandowski. Steve Bannon and pro-am baby daddy Jason Miller are back in the loop. Trump got the band back together, but it feels more like a Team of Yokos than a working unit. They seem to spend the majority of their time talking shit about each other rather than running a campaign. You love to see it. […]
But for all this pain, and for all his rising fear, Trump will never quit this race.
Even as he grows to loathe the burdens of the presidency more with each passing day, Trump realizes that without the power of his office (and the sword and shield of Bill Barr to protect him), every conceivable chicken will come home to roost. His is not a future in cosseted luxury but billion-dollar legal bills, the slow betrayal of everyone around him and the destruction of what remains of his vaunted brand.
Trump is trapped in this campaign, and we’re trapped with him. Desperate, pinned animals are still dangerous as hell. Don’t imagine for a moment there’s a limit on what he’ll do or say to win, no matter how bad it gets.
The presidency is a hard job for the men — so far — who have done it. Thomas Jefferson called it “a painful and thankless office” and said it brought him “nothing but unceasing drudgery and daily loss of friends.” George Washington said the presidency gave him “feelings not unlike those of a culprit who is going to the place of his execution.” William Howard Taft said the White House was “the lonesomest place in the world.” Warren Harding called it “a prison. I can’t get away from the men who dog my footsteps. I am in jail.” Now if these gentlemen are saying this, and they sought the presidency, at least Jefferson and Washington did, with all their hearts, because they sought to make a difference in the world with a bold new plan of government, can you imagine what the game show host must feel? He called the White House “a dump,” remember?
No, Trump is trapped. Trapped by the need to feed his own addiction and pump up his insecurities with the cheers and the social media likes, and the need to stay out of another form of federal housing altogether. We’re stuck with this election, but it’s all for the best. Having him go down in flames in a landslide is the best way to deal with this, better than impeachment, better than him resigning. And take heart from the fact that as miserable as we are, Trump would love to cut and run. This is exactly the time in the festivities when he files for bankruptcy. But this time he can’t. He has to go all the way through this and pay the bill — and for him, there is no greater torture than being an adult and facing the music. On November 3 the world’s biggest loser will find himself in the same place as George McGovern and Walter Mondale. And he will freak.
get downright gleeful thinking about his losing.
And it’s got to be by a landslide. He will lie to himself about election fraud and Deep State machinations and God knows what. But if he goes down resoundingly in flames then it’s going to be hard to argue the result.
The interesting or amusing part of that scenario is, the more nasty things he says and does the more he seals his fate. He’s caught in a feedback loop that feeds on itself.
He is going to be ugly up to the election. I shudder to think how ugly he’s going to be after the election and before January 20.
While SOME nastiness will happen, Ursula, it’ll likely be like the end of the W administration: more goosed-up fears than things to be fearful of.
Ursala, I’ve said before that “lame donald” period will be the worst. He will be like a kid kicked out of the fraternity house, trashing everything on his way out.
I can’t agree more. I can’t even begin to speculate what he will do — or not do.
Lame Donald Duck
I don’t believe he’s going to do anything. Write my prediction down: if he loses he’s going to abandon the job and fly down to Mar-a-Lago to sulk and tweet for the next 2 1/2 months His attitude will be “If you don’t want me, you don’t deserve me, so fuck you, America, I’m not lifting a finger.”
You mean he’s not already there now, Anastasia, minus the Mar-A-Lago angle?
So totally true. His feedback loop is gleefully cannibalistic if its okay to anthropomorphize something as ephemeral as a loop :-0
Cheryl, my thoughts exactly! I hope tRump keeps right on being tRump because his instincts will indict him every time. Rick Wilson called him tRump L’oeil (“trompe l’oeil” is French for “fool the eye). He’s only fooling himself and his rabid base.
It will be, Ursula. Too much is going against him right now. And if the Dems flip Texas…hoo boy.
Texas turning blue is the perennial Democratic wet dream. I really hope we live to see it this election.
C’mon, Ursula…you have to admit that it’s never been more possible.
I’m not raining on our parade, here. I’m just acknowledging that the issue comes up with great regularity. I held hopes that Hillary might pull it off in 2016 because of all the papers in Texas endorsing her.
Exactly. And that cadre of lawyers all set to go, as Biden says, “to prevent election chicanery,” will see that the results have not been tinkered with.
We have to safeguard this election. This is the biggest election in our history and I don’t want to get paranoid about what Putin might be up to.
Another Harding quote on the presidency: “Frank, it is hell! There is no other word for it!” And really Wilson should’ve known better than type that last sentence. It’s been proven that there IS a limit on what Trump can do: his own decaying intelligence, which started off pretty low to begin with. He’s selling wolf tickets here for two reasons: 1) engagement of his audience to get him out of there and 2) mythmaking so that they’re facing Doctor Doom rather than a failed henchman Doom would have disintegrated on the spot. I mean, would YOU want to admit a twerp like this destroyed your life’s work?
Wow! This Ursula: “And take heart from the fact that as miserable as we are, Trump would love to cut and run.” (Politizoom, Faw) Succinct and powerful. Truth? I hadn’t til you wrote this thought of it that way, but it certainly makes a lot of sense. He must be feeling mighty darned trapped about now.
We should continue to discourage him, yes?
He deserves it.
This is why he fell apart with Hannity in Wisconsin. He doesn’t want this election. I firmly believe if he could withdraw and still be a “winner” somehow, he would. This is the first time he hasn’t been able to put in a fix, or run, and he’s 74 years old.
Really agreed with you and enjoyed this article. Can’t wait for President Tweet to ‘leave the building’.
Only slight change would be the last paragraph which mentioned Mondale and McGovern. They were both decent and hardworking men and I can’t even compare 45 to them. I do get the flaming loss comparison though. I would say somebody more like George Wallace, though he never got the nomination.
If I can make it thru hurricane season, not lose anymore friends to COVID and get Donald gone – I’ll be a new woman! And a new and improved USA will be on its way too.
Miles to go though….
thanks Ursula
Once again, the Wallace comparison seems to forget the man DID change and he DID make amends for all his bad behavior.
In his final terms as Governor of Alabama, he made sure that more African-Americans were employed by the State than at any time since the Reconstruction period (and not just in civil service work but as members of his Cabinet).
When he died, he was eulogized by Blacks and Whites–even many civil rights workers who’d suffered during the “racist” period. It’s worth remembering a good deal of that racism was pure show; his first run for Governor was endorsed by the NAACP and it was only his being crushed in the election that he turned into the racist caricature so many want to lock him into.
Mondale and McGovern became respected elders. I don’t think that’s going to happen to Trump.
After John Adams was sworn in, Washington told him “I am fairly out, and you are fairly in. We shall see which of us is the happier.”
Trump is unfairly in office, and hopefully will be unceremoniously kicked out in a landslide – fairly even though the GOP and Putin will do all they can to steal the election. As for happy, Trump will never be unhappier than the day after when he can’t get anyone to take his calls because they will be too busy talking to their lawyers to try and save their own asses. And Putin won’t have any use for him if he loses and won’t want to talk to him either.
What I do however fear is that once Trump has had time to lick his wounds he’ll get a message from Vlad. Hand delivered like the letter that came with that “birthday gift” Trump got right after the infamous Trump Tower meeting. What would the message say? My guess is that for every day of the rest of his Presidency Trump had better demand detailed written PDBs as well as volumes of supporting information. And that he’d damned well better take on a Putin assigned transition assistant to copy all that shit on to flash drives – basically collect and hand over to Putin every bit of classified information he (Trump) can get his hands on.
I think OUR security people will do everything possible to prevent that.
Jack Ohman has a sharp pencil:
https://www.sacbee.com/opinion/editorial-cartoons/jack-ohman/article243969977.html
Not soon enough for me ..
We must keep him in ‘federally provided housing’.
What he liked most of all is we the people paying for everything and him robing all the money from his campaigns to take care of his lawyers and whatever else he could use it for. Oh the control that Barr gave him and Moscow mitch gave him to keep him out of the wayThey all gutted this country and Manichean stealing our money to give to themselves. My hope is to see them all shamed and walk the plank and to have everything they ever stoled returned and I know that wishful thinking but not impossible