by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
The thing about Mueller’s testimony to Congress being such a dud is both sides learned the wrong lesson. House Trump got cocky. They thought they could begin the second, more sinister phase of Trumplandia without anyone doing anything about it. The Trump opposition, meanwhile, began to think Trump was simply a political force of nature that they could never defeat.
But, guess what — Trump is a self-own artist.
It’s darkly humorous how eager Maggie Haberman of The New York Times is to say in a quiet, droll tone how Trump is using his native Leadership Principle abilities to subtly influence various portions of the electorate with his political genius.
This, of course, is complete and total horseshit. Trump’s a barely functioning human being much less some sort of modern day Machiavelli. What Trump is, is very, very lucky. Someone like Trump was bound to pop up at some point between 2016 and 2024, it was just a matter of whom. And, really, I grow ever more concerned about who will be Trump’s fascist successor than I am he himself — not that he’s not an autocrat wannabe. As Benjamin Wittes of Lawfare once quipped, “Trump’s malevolence is only mitigated by his incompetence.” Or something along those lines.
In other words, Trump’s nothing more than a deranged version of Being There’s Chauncey Gardner. That’s it. That’s all that’s going on. This brings us to some potential gotterdammerung impeachment strategies on the part of House Trump. I see these likely happening for no other reason than Trump is hysterical the thought of simply being impeached. When he faces a trial in the Senate, his mental state is likely to explode, not implode. We may face weeks of a demonstrable insane person running the government until the painfully slow wheels of government get around to convicting Trump — not really on the matter at hand, buth is extremely unstable mental state. (The 25th Amendment is a dead letter for the time being.)
Anyway, one of these potential gotterdammerung impeachment strategies is holding the government hostage. House could shut the government down and simply say, “You don’t get your government back until you end the impeachment process.”
This will, for about 24 hours, dominate the impeachment narrative. Maggie Haberman will coo at Trump’s political genius. The MAGA talking heads of FOX will huzzah. And, honestly, it might work given how fucked up the world is right now.
But it might not.
As it sinks in to the average person what is going on, there’s a decent chance this won’t slow impeachment down at all. It will, in fact, only heighten the sense of urgency and build pressure for conviction. This would go with my general belief that if Trump is convicted, it won’t even be because of the actual politics of what he’s accused of doing — it will be his complete and total mishandling of House Trump’s reacting to the impeachment process.
Another, more ominous, potential gotterdammerung impeachment strategy is Trump becomes transactional in his Twitter offenses. He starts to tell people what he wants them to do, in other words. He doxes the Whistleblower and “jokingly” tells people to “teach him a lesson.” Or a few carbomb’s explode in New York City with pro-Trump people claiming credit. Again, initially, things will be on House Trump’s side because generally a lot of people do not want Trump to be convicted. A lot of very powerful people — on both sides of the political spectrum — have a vested interest in Trumplandia lasting a full eight years.
But…
There’s also a good chance that once the shot wears off, the average American who to date has been pretty blase about impeachment will freak the fuck out. This is yet ANOTHER example of how Trump is not what Maggie Haberman would have you believe — Trump’s political firebreak is apathy. If people start dying in some last-gasp gotterdammerung impeachment strategy on the part of rabid Republicans, there’s a pretty good chance the average moderate American might stop thinking about raising their kids and paying their mortgage long enough to demand Trump be convicted by the Senate as soon as fucking possible.
I would say the most important thing to remember is the country can not withstand this much political turmoil without something really fucking bad happening. I simply can’t case out the endgame right now. And whatever the endgame is, we’re in a new political era. We will no longer be in the post-9/11 Era, we will be in either the American Carnage Era or the Post-Trump Era.
