The Fat Lady Sings

 

Tr*mp the Opera approaches the finale faster than I anticipated, with a climax somewhat more surprising than it should have been.  I wonder what they were saying from the pulpits of the megachurches this morning.

While impeachment at this point seems like a long shot, it would be worth the effort if it can deprive Tr*mp of his post-presidential retirement benefits, including a million bucks a year in travel expenses (and half-a-million more for Melania), lifetime Secret Service protection, and a pension equal to the salary of a Cabinet official.  Fittingly, he won't get lifetime health insurance, which only kicks in after five years of Federal employment.  I can't object if he's signed up for Medicare.

Meanwhile, it looks like the Republican Party is fracturing, which is not necessarily good news for progressives.  If there is "bipartisan cooperation" between Republican and Democratic "moderates," the Senate may as well elect Joe Manchin the new Majority Leader.  Granted, even that would be better than having McConnell in charge.

As for Tr*mp's "base," it will survive, albeit somewhat diminished.  Just how diminished remains to be seen: those who get their "news" from One America Network, Parler, and 4chan, or who live in communities where Romney is seen as a liberal, can cling to their alternative realities for a long time.  (FOX will follow the eyeballs and the ad revenue.)

Needless to say, Biden's FBI will have to pay a lot more attention to domestic terrorism.

Saving the Republican Party

As I'm sure you've noticed, Our President is batshit crazy — and he's been getting worse.  As impeachment pressures grow, his general demeanor is deteriorating and his rants and rage-tweets are increasingly bizarre.  Up to this point, Republican efforts to rationalize Tr*mp's irrationality have been strained, but effective enough to mollify his base.  The Zelensky phone call opened some cracks in GOP unity– even at Fox News – but none large enough to do real damage.

The Erdogan phone call, however, is different.  Tr*mp's base may not understand much, but they understand treachery and betrayal; they recognize a stab in the back when they see it.  After years being told of the bravery and loyalty of the Syrian Kurds – consistent "good guys" in all the media – Tr*mp's abandonment of America's allies against ISIS has to feel like a gut-punch to his admirers.  Real damage has been done, and none of the President's arguments for American self-interest or realpolitik is likely to reverse it.

In other words, Tr*mp's chance at a second term took a serious hit over the past few days; and since a narrow win in the Electoral College looked like his best  path to victory, the situation is dire.  A serious drubbing by Democrats in 2020 will endanger Republican control of the Senate as well.  What's a Bible-thumping stooge of the plutocracy to do?

Here's an idea: sidestep that embarrassing impeachment inquiry and invoke the 25th Amendment. With all due sympathy for his "illness," dump Tr*mp and give the presidency to Pence.  Our Vice-President has kept a low enough profile over the past three years to maintain his undeserved reputation for moral probity.  He could win.

It won't happen, of course.  Pence doesn't have the chutzpah to start the ball rolling, and the sycophants, enablers, and co-conspirators in the Cabinet would be too terrified to follow through.  Still, should you happen to run into Charles Koch any time soon, pass the idea along: he just might like it.

The Pelosi Problem

Some of Our President's most ardent supporters mightily resent that burdensome restriction of their religious liberty that stops them from burning witches.  The first one they would consign to the flames, of course, would be Nancy Pelosi, whose least flattering photos have appeared in more Republican campaign commercials than Ronald Reagan and George Washington combined.

So what is it about Pelosi that makes her the GOP's go-to personification of evil?  Democratic Speakers like Tip O'Neill or Jim Foley never incurred such vitriolic animosity, although they were every bit as partisan and every bit as powerful.  What makes Pelosi so "special?"

Correct!  You got it on the first guess!  She's a woman.  Conservatives are staunch upholders of "traditional values" — and what deeply held belief is more "traditional" than misogyny?  To the conservative mind, the very idea of a woman exercising great power is unsettling — frightening — as unnatural as a cat quoting the Book of Revelation (or, perhaps, a black president.)

It's kind of pathetic: the chief motivator of conservatives in general, and the Republican base in particular, is fear.  Xenophobia, usually defined as fear of strangers, has a more generalized definition: fear of anything perceived as strange.  It's a debilitating condition.

Personally, I think it's time for the gerontocracy to give up the reins, but if Pelosi becomes Speaker again, it will be fine with me.

Corruption

In India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi invalidated most of India's cash in an effort to fight corruption.  Many believe his attempt at a cure may be more devastating than the admittedly severe disease, but it certainly is a valiant attempt.

In the United States, many believe that our President-elect will not be tempted to use his office to further enrich himself because "he's already rich."  Well, he was born rich, and had more money, decades ago, than you and I could spend in a lifetime — but somehow that didn't slow his pursuit of lots more.  Becoming President is not likely to change his behavior.

A little thing like the Emoluments Clause won't stand in his way.  A Republican Congress is not about to impeach and convict a Republican president for a little bit of self-dealing — nor, for that matter, a lot of self-dealing.  We can expect revisions to the tax code to make the party's benevolent billionaires even richer, at the expense of the rest of us.  We can expect windfalls for military contractors, the banking industry, any company that takes advantage of "public-private partnership" opportunities and, of course, property developers.

Deficit hawks will insist such expenditures be "paid for" with spending cuts in other areas.  The most "obvious" places for cuts already are being eyed hungrily by GOP ideologues: environmental protection, health care (including Medicare and Medicaid), Social Security, the tattered remains of the rest of the social safety net, and regulatory enforcement.

Anybody who expects our President-elect to start behaving like a "normal" president when he takes office is even more delusional than he is.

Etc.

Refugees
Angela Merkel and the rest of the EU entered into a devil's bargain to deal with the flow of mostly Muslim refugees, the devil in question being Recip Tayip Erdogan.  I suppose they preferred to deal with a devil outside the EU rather than the nativist devils who put increasingly fascist governments in charge in Poland and Hungary, and are threatening the rest of Europe as well.

Brexit
See above.  The nativists of UKIP are eating away at Britain's Conservative Party, and the controversy over EU membership is threatening to split the Conservatives in much the same way that Tr*mpism is threatening to split the Republicans on this side of the pond.

"Our" Muslims
Obama is pissing off the Saudis.  Good.  It's about time.  Somebody has to do something to end the human rights abuses in Yemen, and cut into support for world Islamism.  While he's at it, maybe something can be done about the buildup of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal, which now seems to include tactical nuclear weapons, and is vulnerable to Taliban attack.

Merrick Garland
Hopefully, the nomination is more a political ploy than a serious indication of the kind of candidate most Democrats want to see on the court.  We've had more than enough "moderation" from Obama himself, and we don't need a Justice who reflects Obama's illiberal views on the primacy of government over individual liberties.

Here we go again...

One out of over one million emigrants who arrived in Europe recently may have been involved in the IS attack on Paris.  To right-wing European governments like those in Poland and Hungary, that is ample reason to continue denying entrance to refugees.  To right-wing politicians like Marine LePen of France, it is an opportunity to expand their bases of paranoid xenophobes.

Needless to say, the opportunity has not been overlooked by American politicians who pander to our homegrown paranoid xenophobes.  Our current immigration policy is so rigid that only 1800 Syrians have gained asylum in the USofA over the past two years — half of them children, and only three per cent men of "fighting age" — but that's not good enough for most Republicans.  Fifteen Republican governors and all Republican presidential hopefuls are on the anti-refugee bandwagon (Christie: Not even three-year-old orphans!), and nobody should be surprised if some purple-state Democrats join them.

I can't imagine how it feels to be one of the Americans who inspire such panders; one of the rigid right-wingers who feel so afraid all the time, despite the assault rifles in their bedroom closets; who see every "outsider" (including our "African" President) as an existential threat; whose dark fantasies haunt our politics as much as they haunt their own twisted little psyches.

I'm glad I can't imagine it.  I'm sufficiently upset by what's real.

Short Subjects for March

CPAC
 This year's Conservative Political Action Conference teaches us an important lesson: we no longer can contrast crazy wack job Republicans with "mainstream" Republicans.  The crazy wack jobs are the mainstream of the party.  Despite the straw poll they took, I don't anticipate Rand Paul getting the presidential nomination for 2016, because he can't have made the military contractors too happy.  Ted Cruz, on the other hand...

Francis
Unlike his predecessor, Pope Francis actually seems to show some human characteristics.  It's a nice change, I suppose, from Benedict, and it's nice that Francis seems to be concerned about the poor.  Still, I wonder if he has the administrative skills to clean up the Curia and the Vatican Bank.  Well, Jesuits often are pretty sharp — so, maybe.  Women, though, will have to wait for the next Pope or, more likely, the next century.

Bradley Manning
The Obama administration's pursuit of "aiding the enemy" charges against Bradley Manning is unconscionable.  How far we have descended from the era of Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon papers!  The Obamists pursue whistle blowers with the same vehemence they pursue undocumented aliens — and in both cases, that's a great deal harder than W ever did.  If Obama sometimes looks like a liberal, it's only by comparison with contemporary wack job Republicans.

Cyprus
There probably is enough loose change under the couch cushions of European plutocrats to bail out Cypriot banks, but most of that money would be going to Russian oligarchs using Cyprus to launder money obtained in ways that might not be exactly legitimate.  I'd suggest dropping the insurance level on deposits to, say, €50,000 and just letting them fail.  Would it shake up the Eurozone?  Uh huh.  Would it be catastrophic? Maybe, but the Euro was a catastrophe from day one.

Regarding Inequality

Inequality in the USofA has been getting more than a little press lately.  That makes sense, of course, since we haven't been less equal in these parts since before the Great Depression.  Needless to say, it doesn't really matter how much inequality there really is, only how much inequality the public perceives there is.  Anyway, here's the Pew Research Center's latest polling data.

I guess I just don't understand Republicans.  The largest number of them, by far, are middle class — and a good many of those are lower middle class.  It's widely said that ideology trumps reality, albeit we have to assume that's just as true of Democrats as it is of Republicans (and, perhaps, even moi.)  Nevertheless, it would be illogical to assume that reality lies somewhere in between Republican and Democratic perceptions.

How much power is too much power?  Here's something both parties might agree to: too much is however much it takes to disable or demolish our democratic institutions.  Personally, I'm of the opinion that democracy and finance capitalism are incompatible.  Are there some among the wealthiest who will refrain from corrupting the political system?  I hope so.  Are there some who are irredeemably corrupt?  Read the news.

What is fair, economically speaking?  Warren Buffet apparently thinks it's unfair that he pays taxes at a lower rate than his secretary does.  I think it's unfair that my 2011 tax rate was higher than Mitt Romney's.  On the other hand, I'm sure Paul Ryan or Mitch McConnell can point out reasons why Buffet's and my interpretations of "fairness" are off the mark.

As for Wall Street, more evidence for its corrupt practices is reported every day — but how much corruption is too much corruption?  Could our economy survive without it, for example?

Your perception may be as good as mine — but I'll never admit it!  ;-)

Santorum??? Surely you jest!

Needless to say, I wouldn't mind at all if Rick Santorum won the Republican nomination — having declared war on women (possibly forgetting that they now are allowed to vote), I honestly don't see how he could win the presidency. Yes, America has moved distressingly far to the right over the past thirty years, but that far?

Listening to Santorum, Romney, Gingrich, and Paul, I'm starting to believe that when Nixon inaugurated his "southern strategy" and Reagan brought the social conservatives into the Republican coalition (bigots, Luddites, and the super-rich, all working together to benefit the super-rich), they unknowingly strapped their party into a suicide vest. The Republican base has moved so far to the right, it risks falling off the edge of its flat earth.

The more states Santorum wins, the harder it will be for the Republican super-delegates to hand Romney the nomination at the convention. Going against the base to that extent would risk splitting the party. If it's a toss-up, though, they still could "draft" somebody who hasn't had a chance to disgrace himself in the endless debates. The last I heard, the real Republican favorite was "none of the above."

But who could it be? Jeb Bush seems to want to wait for 2016; Chris Christie, despite having such a Christlike name, still might be too fat and too northeastern; Tim Pawlenty comes over as a total wimp; even John McCain is not so senile that he doesn't realize he's too senile to run again; Eric Cantor wants John Boehner's job, not Obama's, and anyway he's still kind of Jewish for the traditionalist Catholics and Evangelicals.

Paul Ryan? He's presentable and articulate, and it might be possible, with enough money spent, to conceal the fact that he's a really mean son-of-a-bitch. At the moment, though, I think he's looking for Cantor's job when Cantor pushes out Boehner. As far as the presidency goes, he's still young enough to wait for 2020 or 2024.

Well, as you know, I don't make predictions anymore — but I'm guessing that Obama will get his second term. If he does, I only can hope he might turn out to be less of a "New Democrat" and more of a liberal.

As 2011 draws to a close...

It's nice to see Republicans attacking Republicans for a change — including, of course, the attack ads against Gingrich in Iowa, but especially the Establishment Republicans slapping around the Tea Party maniacs to stop them from blocking an extension of the Payroll Tax holiday. Could it be the GOP (with an especially fond wave to Dick Armey) created Frankenstein's monster leading up to the previous election cycle? Probably not. Not only are most American voters not paying attention, but most didn't even know what the controversy was about.

Okay — if they'd seen their take-home pay go down as of their first paychecks in January, they might have figured out what was happening, and perhaps even who was at fault. Now that the crisis is averted (or at least delayed for two months), there will be spin — and individual perceptions will depend on individual choice of news outlets.

And, yes, I'm one of those arrogant asses the average American loves to hate. Needless to say, so is Newt — and his "all positive campaign" is meant to suppress memories of just what an arrogant ass he's been in the past. Honestly, though, I can't imagine him winning the nomination. People don't change that much as they age, and he's overdue for a self-destructive detonation.

***

Meanwhile, Iraq, Pakistan, Syria, Afghanistan, Egypt, and other so-called countries are strenuously enacting these famous lines from Yeats (1919):

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

No, I don't think "the Second Coming is at hand." Just the same old shit. Happy holidays.

The Republican Debate

Unlike most of America, I actually watched it. Needless to say, what most of America thinks about it depends on what most of America's individually preferred media have to say about it. Here are some personal impressions:

Rick Santorum's facial expressions, as he listened to the few questions the moderators bothered to address to him, precluded anybody actually listening to whatever answers he eventually offered. "Gee," I thought, "he looks like he comes to school on the little bus." I suspect he won't be around for the next debate. (By the way, the eventual answers were not too impressive either.)

Michele Bachman's hair and makeup were just wrong. There was a bit too much blue eyeliner, and a hell of a lot too much hair lacquer. Many will say that it's a shame that a female candidate's appearance should matter so much, but appearances matter just as much for male candidates as well. As for what she had to say, who knows? She got totally predictable questions, and answered them with generally off-topic talking points.

Newt Gingrich, who knows he's out of it, was just having fun. I kind of enjoyed the way he stirred the pot — when the "moderators" (ha!) gave him the chance. As a long-term pot stirrer myself, I just had to smile.

Herman Cain acquitted himself nicely. Although I suspect nobody in the mostly Tea Party audience was following his "9-9-9" plan, he sounded as if he knew what he was talking about, which, of course, is what matters most. The plan itself would exacerbate the rift between the rich and the poor (and the decimation of the middle class) in the United States, but it is proof that race need not be a significant factor in the class war. Wealth is colorless. Nevertheless, as we're all aware, he doesn't stand a chance.

Jon Huntsman has good hair, but he's a bit too tan. Is that supposed to suggest that he actually spent time outdoors in Afghanistan? If so, I suspect that suggestion might be just too subtle for the Republican base. Anyway, he didn't use the opportunity of the debate to establish himself as a centrist — his only chance to differentiate himself from the pack — and hence made little or no impression at all.

Ron Paul came over as aged and frail, I'm afraid. He's lost the oomph he showed four years ago, and while he tossed a dart or two at Perry, they didn't hit very hard.

So, that leaves Mitt Romney and Rick Perry, the front-runners. In the handsome-off, I thought Romney had a slight advantage tonight — that is, until MSNBC tossed in an homage to Ronald Reagan (presumably because the debate was held at the Reagan Library.) Perry, we could see, looks a lot more like Reagan that Romney does.

The big news, however, will be that Romney wants to preserve Social Security while Perry wants to end it. Given that primary voters tend to be a bunch of old farts like me, I'd say "advantage Romney" for tonight — but you can't, by any means, count Perry out.

Hell. He really looks quite a lot like Reagan.

War on Workers

Republicans have taken control of state governments in more states than I like to think about. Since this is a census year, they will get to gerrymander with impunity. Idiot working class voters who supported them will get it up the ass. Probably, they deserve it for being so stupid, but you really can't blame people for being so stupid when government has taken so many actions to keep them stupid for so many years.

Those Republican state victories, however, are likely to do more damage to working people than most of us "liberals" are likely to consider. As many as ten previously Democratic or divided states, now controlled by Republicans, are enthusiastically embracing "right to work" laws.

"Right to work" may have been the first seizure of terminology by Republicans that made Democrats look like they were the enemies of workers. Completing the phrase brings us to "right to work with full union benefits without paying union dues." Democrats ought to call them "free rider" laws — but they don't.

Right now, only about seven percent of private sector employees are union members. For the public sector, the percentage is somewhere in the thirties. The targets of the new "free rider" laws, needless to say, are the unions that still have some power — the state and local employees who still earn decent incomes while workers in the private sector continue to fall behind.

If the oligarchy is to continue leaching wealth from the middle class, the only place from which to suck it is the public sector. While the public sector unions might do more to contain the oligarchy, they are not looking ahead in any significant way. Most of them are entangled with the Obama-Clintonista crew, who continue to bend over and offer their well-used rosebuds to Wall Street and the megacorps.

Nobody is on our side. Nobody at all.