Ian Welsh

The horizon is not so far as we can see, but as far as we can imagine

Category: Trump Era Page 2 of 11

Why Impeachment Has No Traction

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On December 2, 2019

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There is a right way, and a reason to do things, and a wrong way and reason to do things.

Democrats are impeaching Trump for the wrong thing, in the wrong way.

As a result, polls show virtually no movement in support for impeaching him or effect on his approval ratings.

Why?

Because they are impeaching him to protect the Democratic front-runner. Trump has done many bad things, starting with being a walking emoluments violation. The Democrats did nothing until he went after Joe Biden pressuring the Ukrainian government while Joe Biden’s son Hunter had a position on the board of a Ukrainian company he had zero qualifications for, except for being Joe Biden’s son.

Joe and Hunter Biden may have done nothing illegal, but they were involved in corruption, and anyone with sense can see it. Legal and right aren’t the same thing, just as illegal and wrong aren’t identical.

So the Democrats are going to the wall, not to protect Americans, but to protect Joe Biden, Democrat, and his son, who are, at the least, involved in unethical, but legal, corruption.

Yeah, Trump blackmailing the Ukrainians to get dirt on an opposition figure is wrong, but Hunter Biden didn’t have to take a job for which he wasn’t qualified and which he had to know he was getting only because Ukrainians wanted to pander to his very powerful father.

An impeachment based on hitting Trump with all the things he’s done illegally, starting with emoluments (remember that Jimmy Carter had to sell his peanut farm to be President, where Trump hasn’t even put his assets and companies in trust), would have been going after Trump for the right reasons.

It would also have allowed an endless parade of clearly corrupt activity, rather than what looks to ordinary people like Trump using the office for partisan political ends, which is gross, but a lot less gross.

Impeachment, done right, for the right reasons, was a virtually sure winner, in the sense that it would harm Trump.

But when you do the right thing for the wrong reason in the wrong way, people see it for what it is, and you lose a lot of the benefit.

Bottom line is that Pelosi never seemed to really care about Trump being corrupt, or about him hurting ordinary Americans. But the moment he goes after Biden, well, she goes for him. She’s acting as nothing but a partisan, and as such, why should Americans care?

Do the right thing, the right way, for the right reasons. Not everyone will notice or care, but enough people will–enough to matter.

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Pelosi Moves to Impeach Trump

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On September 24, 2019

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Nancy Pelosi

This is a good thing. Trump’s done more than one thing that was illegal and impeachment-worthy.

It is interesting and amusing that what finally got her to do something was to attack Biden–someone she knows well–rather than all the crimes against people she doesn’t care about, but if that’s what it takes, so be it.

Impeachment, done properly, is about using the power of the House to control the narrative and build the case. It was not popular when it started against Nixon; it was the impeachment hearings themselves that made the case.

One hopes that Pelosi and her team will take this into account, and showcase Trump’s various misdeeds properly. One also hopes they will stop playing patty-cake with Trump officials and use Congress’s powers of inherent contempt on those who refuse to testify, or who lie.

Of course, Trump will not be convicted. But he can easily be damaged, and his ability to enact his policies can be crippled. Clinton’s impeachment attempt was followed by two Republican presidential terms.

It will be interesting to see if Pelosi has any ability to follow blood in the water.

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Republican Daddies and Democratic Mummies

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On July 25, 2019

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Robert Mueller

So, Mueller, the Savior, the Chosen One, He Who Was Going to Take Down Trump, has testified, and it’s a big, flat, flop.

As before, he won’t clearly say anything. It’s all dancing. Yes, you can read between the lines and get what he’s saying, but he won’t be straight and give lines on which to hang a prosecution.

Mueller, of course, is Republican.

Democrats go crawling to a Republican to save them, and then he doesn’t. This is a surprise?

Meanwhile, Nancy Pelosi, who as Majority Leader in 07-08 refused to use her power against Bush in any meaningful way, also refuses to impeach Trump.

Of course, Trump has been impeachable since day one on emoluments charges. He’s clearly in violation, there is no defense.

It’s almost certain the Senate wouldn’t convict him, but impeachment hearings would let the Democrats control the news cycle for months, and drag every piece of corruption out into the daylight.

It would help, of course, if Pelosi was willing to use inherent contempt to force testimony from reluctant witnesses.

Pelosi is party leader because she fundraises and gives to other Democrats. She is personally rich, as with essentially all political leaders in the United States. The country is being run more or less how she wants it run. She’s done fine, her family has done fine, her friends have done fine.

She pushes through some stuff on the margins to help, but will never push to change anything fundamental or really rock the boat.

That’s who she is, and anyone who denies it is has their head up their ass, or perhaps up hers.

The Republican daddy won’t save you (why did Obama put a Republican in charge of Defense?). The Democratic Mummy’s job is to keep you pacified while her class get richer and richer.

Those are the simple truths. If you support Pelosi, and you aren’t doing really well, you’re a fool. As for Mueller, he was never going to save anyone, and he gives no appearance of particularly wanting to do so.

If they wanted to use it, the Democrats have the power of inherent contempt (and can use the DC jails if they choose–DC is under Congress’s control).

They refuse to even do that, let alone impeach.

This is because they don’t, actually, want to. Why would they? They’re doing fine, and if some of their supporters aren’t, well, a sucker is born every second.

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Trump Will Leave and Will Not Launch a Coup

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On April 23, 2019

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I keep seeing this talking point that “Trump will not leave voluntarily.”

How exactly would he stay?

Trump has not taken the steps necessary for a military coup: The man hasn’t even been filling all the vacancies properly. The military will not support him if he tries to stay after losing an election.

Trump doesn’t have the right personality or skill set for this. I’m not one of those who denies Trump all competency: The man stayed rich, slept with beautiful women, and won the US presidency. He’s good at getting what he wants.

But the man who will end US Democracy is not yet in the White House, and it isn’t Trump. He is not organized enough, he does not keep loyal lieutenants and he cannot delegate properly.

Trump will leave when his time is up. If for some reason he tries to stay, he will not have the support to do so.

The US is in the danger zone for a Caesar, no question. It may well happen. It just won’t be Trump.

Wait for the competent, genuinely charismatic authoritarian or demagogue.

Running around spewing nonsense about Trump makes people in “the boy who cried wolf mode,” and when or if the actual threat happens, they will not be taken seriously. Thanks to their spewing, no one may be.

Integrity.

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The Mueller Report: Who Cares?

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On March 25, 2019

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I’m running a little late on this one as I found out Friday night that I had to be out of my place Tuesday. My landlord was not up to fire code, and the city was (is) going to shut the place down on Tuesday. So, a scramble to find a new place, though in the end I found something nicer in a better location.

Right then, Mueller. I haven’t written much about “RussiaGate.” There are other people who have done a better job, taken a closer look.

The Barr letter (pdf) summarizes the finding. Mueller found that the Trump campaign was not engaged in a conspiracy with Russia to steal the election, although the Russians did try to effect the election. He punted on whether Trump was guilty of obstruction of justice, and Barr, as one would expect, decided that obstruction had not occurred.

I’m not going to go into the weeds on this. Trump is clearly corrupt and clearly meets the emoluments bar for impeachment.

I never liked RussiaGate, for a number of reasons:

The DNC Hack Information Was Correct

I think that for ordinary people the fact that the DNC was trying to fix the primary for Clinton over Sanders is actually more important that the fact that the scuzzy behavior was discovered by hacking.

Mueller Is a Republican

I really don’t understand this fetish for thinking Daddy Republicans will take down other Republicans. I’m not saying Mueller is corrupt or looked the other way, but why keep expecting Republicans to do your job for you?

It Distracted from Real Problems

Clinton just ran a bad campaign. She didn’t campaign in the key post-industrial battleground states which cost her the election and she ceded the populist economic argument to Trump, among a number of errors. She just isn’t a good campaigner. She lost a Primary to Obama which was hers to win, she lost against Trump, the Presidential candidate with the highest negatives of any candidate since polling. She was just a bad candidate.

But more to the point, acting as if Trump was more important than bad campaigning, gerrymandering and voter suppression puts attention away from issues that Democrats could actually learn from and do something about onto a spooky “evil” foreigner. The demonic Putin, who despite leading a state which is much smaller than the US, the EU, or China in terms of population and GDP, is apparently the Dark Lord reborn and from whom all bad things follow.

If Russian interference made the difference it made the difference because the election was so close that everything made the difference, and because there were real American problems (and wrongdoing at the DNC) to exploit.

Russiaphobia Is Baaadddd

Russia may be a declining great power, but it is still a great power with a LOT of nuclear weapons and one into whose sphere of influence the US has been aggressively pushing. A lot of Russians genuinely think America wants war with them. They’re scared.

And, yeah, a scared declining great power with a lot of nukes is… baaaaddddd.

Concluding Remarks

Trump is corrupt and has engaged in illegal activity. Mueller was never needed to prove that, because he does much of it openly. He never did get rid of the Magnitsky sanctions, which is mostly what Russia wants (and which I think should be gotten rid of), and when you look at substantive actions has done little that is good for Russia. I actually would like better relations between the US and Russia, to avoid war and possibly nuclear war and so on, so I think this is bad, but it’s all a sideshow.

If Democrats want to impeach Trump, you can do it now. Can’t convict in the Senate, but he’s clearly guilty and they can drag him through the mud any time they want: He’s corrupt and rotten to the core. (In ways that are more obvious than Obama’s terrible corruption, because Obama waited to be paid off until after he was out of office, just like Bill Clinton.)

Russiagate, whatever validity it has, was always bad politics and a way of avoiding real problems. Democrats need to stop expecting Daddy Republicans and the FBI to save them and take steps to win and defeat Trump themselves.

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There Is No Downside to Impeaching Trump for Democrats

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On March 14, 2019

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Nancy Pelosi recently said:

Impeachment is so divisive to the country that unless there’s something so compelling and overwhelming and bipartisan, I don’t think we should go down that path, because it divides the country. And he’s just not worth it.

I note, first of all, that Nancy Pelosi ruled out impeaching George Bush, so her reluctance to impeach for clear crimes is consistent with her record. I never understood why others thought that Pelosi would be pro-impeachment. The idea that she’s some partisan fighter is contradicted by her record. Pelosi is what she has: She has beliefs, and those beliefs include that the right is respectable and that left are unrealistic losers (as when she dismissed the Green New Deal).

But let’s leave Pelosi aside for a moment. The Democrats have control of the House. They can impeach. They cannot convict in the Senate, but impeachment is certainly possible.

Why would they want to?

Because it would cripple Trump and the Republicans. During the period of the impeachment, Republicans would be able to get virtually nothing done, except by executive fiat.

This is because the impeachment hearings would completely dominate months of news cycles–constantly hammering in every illegal, crooked, corrupt, and cruel thing that Trump has done.

This is largely a no-lose strategy, if you were actually partisan: There isn’t a lot that House Dems can get through anyway while the Republicans control the Presidency, Senate, and Supreme Court. They can’t actually get most of their legislation through without crippling compromises, so this is fine.

They need to take control the news cycle; to make sure bad legislation doesn’t pass for months; keep Trump tied down fighting impeachment and, on top of that, spend months talking about every shitty thing he has done.

Some may argue impeachment might “backfire,” that Americans “want to see legislators working,” but that sort of argument has been made for decades. Contempt for Congress isn’t going to get much worse (it hardly can), and if working means doing the wrong thing, it’s better not to.

In the face of all the positives, like dragging Trump through the mud, crippling his ability to do anything, and controlling the news cycle, impeachment starts looking, politically, like the obvious thing to do.

And if you actually care about justice, well, Trump is at the very least, a walking emoluments violation. He is clearly profiting from being President. Carter had to sell his peanut farm, Trump hasn’t even put anything into blind trusts and many of his businesses are clearly profiting from his Presidency.

Bush should have been impeached. Trump should be impeached. Ironically, Clinton, who was impeached, shouldn’t have been (lying about consensual sex is a ridiculously low bar).

Pelosi made the wrong decision with Bush. She appears in danger of making the wrong decision here. I doubt she’ll change her mind, but I hope I’m wrong.

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The Question Isn’t Manafort’s Short Sentences

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On March 13, 2019

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So, now we have two sentences for Paul Manafort. According to guidance, they should have added up to between 19 and 24 years, they come in to about seven-and-a-half years.

This is bad.

It isn’t bad because he should be locked away for longer in any grand sense: US sentences are too long. It is bad because, he, a rich, white, and white collar criminal with political connections is being sentenced way below guideline when people are locked away for far longer for crimes like petty theft or possessing marijuana.

It is wrong because it is unequal.

Suddenly, when the criminal is rich, white, and politically connected, judges find that they can and will sentence to less–much less–than mandatory minimums.

What a surprise.

That said, Manafort is 69 and will soon be 70. If these sentences, plus one more still to come, are actually served, there’s a good chance he’ll die in prison.

Unsaid, also, is that these sorts of crimes aren’t usually even prosecuted. The prosecution of these crimes was a political decision, for a political crime. (This isn’t to argue they shouldn’t be prosecuted: Laws should be either enforced or gotten rid of.)

The real question, which won’t be answered until Manafort’s final trial is over, is whether or not Trump will pardon him.

Unless Trump is insane, the answer is yes. If Manafort isn’t pardoned, everyone else will cut deals with Mueller.

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Fight Over Something That Matters; “The Wall” Mostly Doesn’t

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On January 9, 2019

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So, here’s something people tend to not mention.

A number of walls have already been built along the US-Mexico border.

The Mexico–United States barrier (Spanish: barrera México–Estados Unidos) is a series of vertical barriers along the Mexico–United States border aimed at preventing illegal crossings from Mexico into the United States. [1] The barrier is not one contiguous structure, but a discontinuous series of physical obstructions variously classified as “fences” or “walls.” In between these constructed obstacles, security is provided by a “virtual fence” consisting of sensors, cameras, and other surveillance equipment that is used to dispatch United States Border Patrol agents to suspected migrant crossings. [2] As of January 2009, U.S. Customs and Border Protection reported that it had more than 580 miles (930 km) of barriers in place.[3] The total length of the continental border is 1,954 miles (3,145 km).

That cost, by the way, about six billion dollars. Trump wants seven billion dollars for his wall, which obviously wouldn’t cover the entire border.

The US has built walls along the border before.

What is more important, I think, is that the real problem isn’t a wall or walls. The real problem is that enforcement is extremely cruel. The problem is that this cruelty is mostly bipartisan: Trump has made it worse, but most of the high-profile cases which first came out happened under the Obama administration, which built plenty of camps; they just kept parents and children together in horribly inhumane circumstances.

What should be done is that responsibility for illegal immigrants should be handed back to a reconstituted “Immigration and Naturalization Service“, who ran it until 2003 (after the Homeland Security reorganization shoved through under 9/11 hysteria).

They were a lot less abusive, though the border patrol was still awful.

But the US wants para-militarized law-enforcement, and Americans believe that people should suffer and suffer bad, so we have the current regime. Again, a ton of abuses and cruelty happened under Obama, and the child separation, while a step too far for Democrats (at least in opposition), came on top of policies which were already disgustingly inhumane.

Seven billion is nothing. It isn’t even chump change in terms of the US budget. The wall is not particularly important in real terms of how it will affects people. It is a symbolic issue: Trump made it his centerpiece, so the Democrats oppose it.

Indeed, the Democratic compromise was to keep funding ICE, but not fund the wall.

This is symbolic politics. Trump’s signature campaign promise was “The Wall.” It doesn’t cost much, it won’t make immigration enforcement noticeably more cruel, but not funding it is a win.

Is it a win worth a government shutdown? Maybe. But crocodile tears about the suffering of civil servants from Dems fighting over a largely symbolic issue fail to impress. If they were actually fighting over stopping child separation, ending camps, or truly getting rid of the current regime and going back to something more humane, that would be worth some suffering, because it would end suffering.

Is this?

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