by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
Despite the giddy statements of Rachel Maddow on this matter, ding-dong Trump being demonstrably less popular in real terms doesn’t mean jack squat. At least for the time being.
The reason is, Trump really is “too big to fail” for Republicans. Trump is the Republican Party and the Republican Party is Trump. To be Republican is to be MAGA. By definition. If you don’t support Trump (in public at least) in such an absolute extent that you come of as completely bonkers to anyone who doesn’t watch FOX “New” every night, then you’re a RINO or a Democrat.
There is no room for compromise on this issue.
So, to imagine a situation where Trump might be knocked out of his status as Fuhrer is simply unimaginable. Even for me, it’s difficult to imagine a scenario where Trump isn’t the nominee and doesn’t become president again — if by hook or by crook — in 2025. We’re no longer a functining democracy and it just doesn’t matter how popular Trump is with the average person.
Trump has the entire edifice of the Republican Party and Bannon’s “administrative coup” will fill the gap if Trump isn’t able to win fair and square. And, at least in my mind, that’s the end of the story.
But, let’s imagine it isn’t. How might it happen? Something would have to happen that punctured Trump’s Der Fuhrer’s air of invincibility like, say, the Battle of Stalingrad did for Hitler.
Or, put another way, something would have to happen whereby Trump faced some accountability, any accountability in a way he has not, to date, faced any. The reason it might happen is there are at least a dozen would-be autocrats chomping at the bit to become extremely powerful and fabulously wealthy being America’s first autocrat. Mike “piece of shit” Pompeo is so cravenly obsessed with wanting to be our first autocrat that he’s losing weigh at an alarming rate.
For Trump to face any accountability, you would have to successfully attack him on a political level. That’s his power — politically he has such absolute power over his base, regardless of how popular he might be otherwise — that any racist, misogynistic dumb thing he says is already baked into the cake.
So, who has the means, motive and opportunity to change that? There’s really only one person.
Mike Pence.
If he pulled a John Dean and turned, on a political basis, state’s evidence against Trump, there is a least a greater-than-zero-sum -chance that people seeing Pence begin to blab about what a piece of shit Trump is might be enough to cause the Justice department to get its head out of its ass and finally, FINALLY charge Trump with something.
But even that is dangerous. Trump is just as likely to use any criminal charges as an opportunity to act like a martyr as he is fold. So, whatever Pence did would have to be pretty dramatic on a political level.
Or, to be even more political about things — someone, somewhere, would have to go out on a political limb to challenge Trump….and not be crushed. The moment is was clear that Trump was no longer The God King Of Republicans, then all hell would break loose because the natural political ambitions of all those other would-be autocrats would kick in an they would suddenly do everything to destroy Trump so it was THEY, not TRUMP would go to murder our democracy at last.
And, what’s more, having said all this, Trump is so bonkers, he always has the failsafe of leaving the Republicans behind and founding The Patriot Party. So, again, Ms. Maddow, I would cool it with any giddy predictions that Trump is going to just fade away and Twitter can go back to people taking pictures of their food.
