He has revealed what those of us who have never supported him and never would, have known about him all along, that he is a pathological liar, a grifter, a spectacularly dishonest man who is so wrapped up in himself that he can't even treat his own family members with respect. Combine that with a huge dose of old age dementia, a long list of anti-social pathology, his abuse of alcohol, drugs and food, and an ego that cannot tolerate perceived disloyalty and does not place any value on, or give any respect to, any other human being, and you have an impending disaster looming, not just over the United States, but over the entire world.
He certainly has the potential to fulfill what his Evangelical religious supporters believe is "the lawless one," the "anti-Christ," the evil one who is prophetically supposed to make an appearance to terrorize the world before the second coming of Christ, in their very twisted, false "end times" eschatology. The fact that they are blind to who he is, and that they have made him their idol only confirms everything that is bad about the fact that he landed in the White House.
So Where Are the Silver Linings in This Black Cloud?
I'm not going to sugar coat anything here, the potential for this wicked, selfish, white supremacist demagogue to do irreparable damage to the United States of America is certainly at the highest level it has ever been in our history. But I've seen some things, even during this first week, that indicate the potential danger under this second Trump term may be relatively short lived. Part of that has to do with the fact that his own mental condition is not capable of getting him through what he's going to face over the next weeks and months, and he's already shown some evidence of that. But most of it has to do with the fact that, in spite of all of the predictions of gloom and doom, and the sensations that the media loves to elicit from always pushing the limits to the worst case scenario, there are still plenty of guardrails in place to hold a renegade chief executive in check, and prevent abuses of power.
Governing by executive order is a very ineffective way to get things done. In these days of partisan gridlock in Congress, it has turned out to be a much more used pathway than intended, but executive orders are extremely limited in their scope. They are not legislation, and the scope of their effectiveness is limited to the ability, and the will, of the executive branch agencies to carry them out. It did not take very long for a whole pile of lawsuits to be filed to effectively stop most of the more abusive orders he issued.
The Constitution cannot be changed just because a President doesn't like its limits on his power. It takes two thirds of both houses of Congress to amend, and with the Republican majority in Congress not being anywhere close to that, any executive orders that are unconstitutional will be slapped down fairly quickly, with no hope of any kind of ruling, even from the current incompetent Supreme Court, to support them. So it was that his order ending birthright citizenship, which is a basic constitutional guarantee, was rendered ineffective the day after it was issued.
Most of the rest of his "orders" were mere bravado, issued so he can brag about what he did on "day one." Whether Alaska's Mt. Denali can go back to being Mt. McKinley or the Gulf of Mexico can become the Gulf of America are signs of his dementia. This doesn't even rise to the level of political minutia, it's something that got stuck in his mind. Someone who wasn't affected by the deterioration of his mind wouldn't have made an issue out of this, and it's this kind of thing that will, sooner than later, lead to enough Republican grief over it, and fear of not being re-elected in 2026, nullify most of what he does.
We'll find out how far our incompetent, partisan Supreme Court will go in holding him back or letting things move forward, but while we currently think of them as a 6-3 Republican majority, I think, when it comes to most of the ridiculousness that is coming down the road, it will be 5-4, with Roberts and Coney-Barrett resisting the temptation to get too far outside the constitutional boundaries. Gorsuch could also fall into that category.
Opposition and Resistance is Forming Fast
The media tried to create the impression that the Democratic party just fell apart and disintegrated in the wake of the election loss. But if there's been a post-election theme that Democrats have picked up and run with, it's the fact that this election was not a mandate. In fact, at the Presidential level, it was as razor-thin as the rhetoric prior to the election indicated it would be. Republicans are having to come up with dishonest shenanigans to prevent a Democrat from taking a seat she won on the North Carolina Supreme Court.
All of the chatter about forcing California to do the bidding of conservatives if it wanted disaster relief money from FEMA for the Los Angeles fires came to a halt when Hakeem Jeffries succeeded in getting California Republican representatives to oppose that nonsense, and since the Republican majority in the House is basically not stable, because there are too many Republicans who actually have to consider their own state's interests, rather than Trump's, when Democrats decide to unite and oppose something, it looks like they'll have enough support to get that done.
My biggest concern is about the national leadership of the party, which Democrats are going to come to the surface now that the Biden administration has ended. Normally, in the wake of a lost election, it takes a while for new leadership to develop. The pressure of the incompetence of a Trump administration will move this forward faster, I think. There are those who are thinking Gavin Newsom is becoming the national leader of the Democratic party, and that may be the result of the attention being paid to the fires in Los Angeles and the fight over federal assistance. Governor Newsom was already at the top of the list, mainly because he's a "get it done" kind of guy, to whom the partisan status quo and party protocol means nothing.
Leadership comes from among those who rise to the occasion. And while the DNC is about to go through the formal process of choosing a new chairperson, that's not going to produce the party's next leader. Response to the extremism of the Trump administration will be the way our next leader rises to the top. Frankly, other than Hakeem Jeffries, there aren't very many Democrats in the House or Senate that seem to be rising to the occasion at the moment. This will provide an opportunity for someone like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who has the qualities we are looking for, and isn't afraid to do the right thing, and Jasmine Crockett, whose outspoken disdain for just about anything Trump is definitely a silver lining in a dark cloud. It's something Senator Fetterman could have succeeded at doing, if he'd made the right choice.
The silver lining here is that, in the response to an abominable Presidential administration, leaders who are willing to make sacrifices for the good of the country, rather than play the old game of political protocol, will be the ones who get the attention, and who people will follow. And that process has already started. There are people in place, some of whom I've mentioned here, others who are about to emerge, who are going to rise to the occasion. I'm excited to see what go-getters like David Hogg and Beto O'Rourke will do.
Silver Linings in the Media: Who Will be an Encouragement, Who Will be Factual
The media's four year long commercial for Trump, covering everything he did, including sneezing and going to the bathroom, figuratively if not virtually, was one of the biggest reasons for his winning the election, aside from some theories of my own that I'll keep to myself for now. But it has created some reactions which are going to be to the advantage of Democrats over the next four years.
First of all, Rachel Maddow is going to be a regular feature of weeknight MSNBC once again, and that's a good thing. She is one of the best commentators on television, and having her back regularly has already been a good thing, as far as I am concerned. I'd love to see some Democratic supporting billionaire buy MSNBC and CNN, and merge the two into a liberal, progressive television news outlet, but for now, I'm glad that Rachel is back.
As far as talk radio is concerned, my morning commute involves getting to listen to the first hour of the Stephanie Miller show. And while Stephanie is more along the lines of political entertainment, her show has become a morale booster in so many ways. She has not compromised or backed down, her show is factual, it provides entertainment along with the commentary, and I'm sure there are people in morning traffic who are looking at me wondering what the heck is going on in my car. One morning, as I pulled up to an intersection, they were poking fun at something Trump had done, and when the punch line came, I noticed the person in the car next to me burst our laughing as well, and I figured they must be listening to the same program.
I think the Trump presidency is not only going to keep providing her with a limitless supply of jokes and laugh lines, it is going to elevate her status among Democrats and left leaning independents. She and her crew do a great job of putting things in perspective and helping me face a day of otherwise gloomy political news. I can't help but think there are thousands of others who benefit the same way. This is how we get our energy not just to get through the day, but to step up and challenge the corruption and incompetence that has returned the swamp to Washington in the form of a Trump administration.
We also need those journalists who are willing to be brutally honest, and tell the truth, calling out our mistakes and miscues and helping to keep us on the right track so that we can fight this administration step by step, stand up for what is right, instead of protecting partisan traditions and being those people who can say, "Well, I told you so," when things go wrong. And I have two of those in mind, who are willing to speak up and keep us straight.
Most people are familiar with Thom Hartmann. Thom is such a calming, matter of fact presence each day, that I have to resist the temptation to wait until I get home to listen to his program. He's one of those guys who speaks with experience and knowledge, is able to figure things out, is willing to tell us the bad news first and then give suggestions as to how to go about dealing with it, and it's not the end of the world when things don't work out the way he thought they would, or that we expected them to go.
Perhaps not as many people are as familiar with David Pakman. David is a podcaster, whose show is as real as it gets, down to the well researched facts that are characteristic of his presentation. He's also one of those people who doesn't sugar coat the truth but tells it like it is, because fixing problems depends on it. He was brutally honest during the weeks of panic following the debate when Democrats made some major mistakes in the manner in which they approached that whole scenario. It made some of his listeners angry at him, at times, I was myself, but he wasn't trying to undermine the party or its candidates, he was trying his best to make sure they got the support from us they deserved. Moving forward, there will not be a more straightforward journalist calling out the failures of Trump than David Pakman.
A Trump Presidency is Unsustainable
This guy corrupts everything he touches. I've seen enough, over the past five days, to be convinced that Trump and his MAGA followers are going to collapse in on themselves long before his four year term in office is over. With his first acts as President being a boatload of mostly unconstitutional executive orders that will be taken down by the courts in relatively short order, he has once again reminded us that he doesn't know what he's doing, that this is a power trip for him and for his benefit and that of the billionaires who give him their loyalty.
It won't be able to sustain itself for four years.
If there's a strong, organized opposition that feeds these unconstitutional executive orders into the court system, where they are regularly struck down, it will go faster.
The media has sensationalized this to the point where they've made people believe that Trump can do whatever he wants without consequences because the Supreme Court is going to allow it, but that's not true. We have a constitution that is going to get in his way, and there is no recourse, not even thought the most convoluted court wrangling possible, to let that happen.
How long will it take for people to realize that putting him back in the White House was a mistake? I don't think that's going to take very long at all. He'll be below a 40% job approval rate in less than a year, and he will leave an open door for us to get this back.
When we do, we need to put into practice the lessons we learned the last time, and make sure our government is demagogue proof. When we see an existential threat to democracy, we need to take the necessary steps to keep it from happening. We need our leaders to be bold and take risks to protect American constitutional democracy.
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