OMG – sometimes I just want to scream at republicans: WAKE UP! Your president, (and, make no mistake, he’s YOUR president – republicans will be attached at the chord if they allow this man to continue in office) Donald Trump is either a BUFFOON or a TRAITOR! During the campaign he repeatedly claimed how smart he is (the “deal maker”) – which (especially for all his “Christian” supporters) always reminds me of the Bible verse: “The man who thinks he knows is the fool, the wise man knows he doesn’t know.” And, I have to admit, I’m thankful for the STUPID part of what Trump is showing us because a more sophisticated BULLY would possibly be able to “get away” with “the Russia thing.” It’s almost to the point where it no longer matters whether Trump “did or didn’t” collude with the Russians (it appears he did based on his actions), the investigation is bringing out his BULLYING tendency to the point where it appears to me, and – of course – “I’m not a lawyer” (how often are we hearing that disclaimer these days?) that, just like Watergate, the coverup could be worse than the crime. (Although, the “colluding,” to me, is treasonous – and, that’s REALLY bad!)
Trump continues to be either brazenly arrogant or incredibly STUPID as this scenario unfolds. I just wrote the other day how STUPID it was for Trump to give an interview to Lester Holt of NBC a day or two after firing James Comey, the head of the FBI who was leading the investigation into the “Russia thing,” and then undermine ALL of his surrogates who were busy “spinning” Comey’s firing in a way to pass the blame to Rod Rosenstein only to have Trump ADMIT he fired Comey because of the “Russia thing.” Then a day or two later he, again, ARROGANTLY, met with the Russian Foreign Minister and the Russian Ambassador (he of all the controversial meetings prior to that date) and, in the process, gave out top-secret classified info and reiterated he “got rid” of Comey to take pressure off the “Russian investigation.” (he added a few disrespectful derogative comments which prompted Comey’s leak leading to the special counsel) All I can say is, who would want to be Trump’s legal counsel?
In the post I was working on I just assumed that someone had talked sense into Trump’s head and he would no longer grant these types of interviews – when he’s talking “off the cuff” things don’t go well – I’ve written my prior posts which would explain why – yet, last night I saw “breaking news” that Trump sat down with three reporters from the “Failing” NY Times, as he usually refers to them, and gave an even more incredible STUPID interview. I have no idea what it’s going to take for the republicans in Congress to realize the gravity of Trump as president, but I can only hope that “we the people” are paying attention so that we can begin the process of correcting this problem in 2018 if they fail to act. Right now, that’s looking like a really long time to have to endure this man in the “White House” – and, as I’ve repeatedly said here, the potential damage he can inflict on “we the people” is historic. Clearly, he’s attempting to turn this nation in a direction that more closely mirrors his good buddy Vladimir Putin and Russia. The same Russia where the “administrative state” has already been “deconstructed.” (in the words of Steve Bannon.)
How long are republicans going to put their power, and their party ahead of the nation? Clearly, they exposed themselves during the Obama administration as their focus was on President Obama’s “failure” instead of America’s success. But, this is getting ridiculous. With Trump, the possibility of MASSIVE damage always exists. especially when I think about the previous republicans who “played” the “war card” during times of political crisis at home. They seem to believe the way to jack up approval ratings is to put our troops in “harms way.” Let’s hope these fears are not well grounded!
Yet, we see hints the republicans in Congress actually realize the gravity of the situation – evidently, they’re just waiting for the “right moment” to move toward removing Trump from office. For example, there’s a bill going through Congress to put additional sanctions on Russia (and Iran and North Korea) that Trump opposes. My understanding of the bill is that Trump won’t be able to remove these (or other) sanctions without meeting preconditions placed on the sanctions by Congress. It appears republicans in Congress are daring Trump to veto the bill. That would certainly make his association with Vladimir Putin even clearer. (not that most of us need any more evidence) This shows that even the republicans in Congress don’t trust Trump!
Trump has proven himself to be a LIAR beyond the imagination of most American political observers – we’re not talking about “spin,” it’s just REAL out and out LIES. And, in the process, he’s shown himself to be pathological. Much of what comes out of Trump’s mouth, and the surrogates who bow down to him (and, I mean that literally – if you’ve ever seen the video of the cabinet meeting where, one by one, his surrogates expressed their blubbering allegiance to him, you know what I mean), falls into the category of delusional. The other day, Sean Spicer resigned his post as Press Secretary, and it should be interesting how much damage he did to his career by LYING, pretty much EVERY day, for Trump. Some of Spicer’s LYING will go down in the history of press secretaries as classic.
At this point Spicer seems like a kind of pathetic victim of having worked for Trump without the guts to quit when he should have. Some of Spicer’s press conferences will be replayed for years as history uses Trump’s presidency as a how NOT to do American politics – and, to demonstrate to those who work for any politician that your oath is to the constitution. As kids we’re (well, at least I was) taught to be respectful and obedient to those in authority over us, UNLESS, we’re asked to something untoward – like, for example, LYING to the American people. Trump’s next “victim,” apparently will be Sarah Sanders – again, showing a willingness to LIE for her “audience of one.” What his surrogates understand, is that if they want to keep their jobs, they will continue the LYING – and, it appears, Trump watches – in real time – every time one of them gets in front of a mike and a camera. In a certain way I feel a sense of compassion for them – but, it’s their careers and their character they are personally responsible for – and, if they continue to cow down, then so be it.
In Trump’s meeting with the “failing” NY Times reporters he made it clear he’s, at some point, going after Jeff Sessions (the first Senator to support him), Rob Rosenstein who Trump, himself appointed as assistant attorney general, and ultimately Robert Mueller in his attempt to stop the “Russia thing.” His own son essentially CONFIRMED that his campaign COLLUDED with the Russians in the recently exposed meeting (of Last June) where Don Jr., Paul Mannafort, and Trump’s son in law Jared Kushner met with a group of Russians offering “dirt” (as many have characterized it) on Hillary Clinton directly from the Russian government designed to help Trump win the election. The “mystery” – for those having trouble with OVERWHELMING circumstantial evidence – is OVER regarding the “did he or didn’t he) regarding COLLUSION. Now the new “wave” of rationalizing has begun in the latest attempt to justify (or deflect) that our president is potentially a traitor.
It’s no secret that Donald Trump believes in “winning at any cost,” and that was how he approached the election in 2016. No one actually thought he’d pull it off (well, almost no one – full disclosure, I lost a bet with a friend who predicted Trump would win), least of all Trump. And, at this point, I’m guessing there are many in Trump’s “circle” who wish he hadn’t won. Not only is the “Russia thing” getting “hotter and hotter,” but I’m pretty sure Mueller is either already perusing Trump’s taxes of the past ten years or so – or will be soon. In the NY Times interview, it was fairly apparent that possibility has Trump very uneasy. For anyone who’s not thinking straight, there MUST have been a very good reason Trump refused to show his taxes prior to the election – and, I’m certain, he was planning for the “audit,” preventing their disclosure, to last for at least EIGHT years! There’s something in there he doesn’t want to see the light of day and my guess is it not only has to do with Russia, but who knows what else? For example, how do you spell money laundering?.
The bottom line here is that if Trump was truly invested in “we the people” and is innocent of any wrongdoing this “drip, drip, drip” of secret – LIED about – meetings with Russians would have been acknowledged from day one of his administration (for example, Kushner wouldn’t have had to redo his security clearance form three or four times). The focus would be on solving the problems of our nation instead of EVERY DAY another chapter in the Donald Trump soap opera. Not only was the actions of Trump’s campaign incredibly stupid, but Trump’s actions since this all started coming out have been beyond STUPID. And, this latest interview may “take the cake.” Clearly, Trump has his “sights” set on Mueller (since the interview I’ve heard surrogates attacking Mueller’s character, for example, claiming he has “conflicts of interest”) and, if he makes a move to fire Mueller, this republican congress will be at a historic crossroads. As much as I don’t trust hardly any of them, I believe even they would not stand for Mueller being fired.
Trump is arrogantly profiting from being president which is a violation of the emoluments clause in the constitution – and, many of his supporters don’t care. In fact, the people I know who voted for Trump don’t care about the “Russia thing.” All I would say to them is that this constitution has worked for well over 200 years and it should be considered a privilege to live in a country which relies on the rule of law – and, not of men/women. It seems we’ve gotten to the point where if it doesn’t negatively affect me then I don’t care what’s happening in our government – and, REMEMBER, we are the government. Personally, I know that I will do whatever I can to make sure The United States doesn’t become a satellite of Russia or any other country – and, I believe our leaders are subject to the laws of the land just as “we the people.” (If you’ve been on this site much, you know my biggest complaint about Barack Obama was his “looking forward instead of back” regarding the war crimes of the Bush/Cheney regime) The allegations aimed at Trump et al are VERY serious – possibly, in my view, the most despicable of crimes.
Trump, clearly, is not going to “come clean” – so, it’s up to republicans in Congress to solve this problem which seems to be heading toward impeachment. I don’t think Trump will resign – as Nixon did – and, he’s already talking about “pardoning himself” – which should catch everyone’s attention. I’m guessing he’ll start the pardoning with Michael Flynn in an attempt to keep him from “telling his story” (do you really believe Flynn’s contact with the Russians was without Trump’s knowledge?) and will include his son, his son in law, and anyone else who might have the “goods” on him. Obviously, if the investigation gets all the way to him he’ prepared to pardon himself. Well, at least, we’ll be able to clear up whether or not a president can do that – it seems to be “uncharted” territory. No matter what happens, the political future in America should be interesting to say the least. And, the investigations should not stop until we fully understand what happened and have a plan to prevent it from EVER happening again!