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Donald Trump

Where Will Mitt Romney Caucus in 2021?

January 5, 2021
by Peter Feinman
Will He Hold the Balance of Power? (Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images)

The title of my blog last February 17, 2020, was “Where Will Mitt Romney Caucus in 2021?” Now we are almost one year later and the time has come to revisit the question. Please note, I am not suggesting Romney could leave the Republican Party either to be an Independent yet alone a Democrat. I am raising the question strictly for caucus’s purpose. That means how he would vote for Majority Leader in the Senate.

When I wrote the blog last year, I used the following breakdown for the Senate just after the vote not to remove the impeached President from office:

52 Trumpicans
1 Republican
45 Democrats
1 Socialist
1 Independent.

As of now as Georgians are voting to elect two Senators the breakdown is:

51 Trumpicans
1 Republican
46 Democrats
1 Socialist
1 Independent.

However the Trumpican contingent is not quite the unified bloc it once was. The recent override on the military spending bill, the failure to support the $2000 Covid relief, and the paltry 13 or so Senators who support the coup, suggest a weakened hold on the Trumpican Senators. Some of them may have been closet Republicans all along now more willing to be outed for what they are.

Still, Romney may be the critical Senator. In order for him to be in a position to negotiate, his vote needs to be critical.

If the Democrats lose both Senate races today, then Romney’s position is weakened and he has no negotiating strength. The exception would be if he could sway one or more Trumpican Senators to be outed as Republicans. That is only likely if the Senator has no concerns about future elections either for the presidency or the Senate. The available pool that meets this criteria is fairly small.

If the Democrats win only one Senate race today and are one vote short of 50, then Romney would have leverage all by himself.

Even if the Democrats win both Senate races today, Romney would have some leverage. The practically of governing with a split Senate where the Vice President is needed to break the tie is doable but awkward. Life would be simpler given the current Senate rules if one party has the majority.

What are the items which could be negotiated in a settlement to determine majority control?

1. The Senate will vote in one month on all nominees by Joe Biden to the Cabinet, the courts, and all other positions. There will be no “Garlands” or shutdowns, or delays. Senators could vote yea or nay, but it is agreed that they will vote in a timely manner.

2. Establish a commission to examine the 2020 election. The areas of investigation include:

Was the election rigged through day of voting actions such as people voting twice, dead people voting, out-of-state people voting, voting machine tampering, multiple counting of ballots and any other action that would affect the vote totals?

Was the election rigged prior to Election Day through voter suppression, gerrymandering, changed Postal regulations and procedures?

Were any attempts made after the election to rig the votes including the calls by the loser not just to Georgia but to other state officials as well?

The American people deserve to know that a fair election was held. The American people deserve to know if people who wanted to vote were prevented from doing so as part of a conscious effort to rig the vote. The American people deserve to know if people who voted improperly regardless of for which candidate did so as part of a systematic program to rig the results, by innocent mistake, or from personal hostility to one of the candidates. The American people deserve to know if the machines used to tally the votes were accurate. Some of that information may come out in the lawsuits by the election machine vendors against the people in the media and their organizations who accused them of fraud solely because they did not like the results.

Millions of Americans are concerned that the vote was not fair, that they have been disenfranchised because their side did not win. A bipartisan commission will go a long way to alleviating fears about the validity of the election results and the legitimacy of the Joe Biden presidency.

Here is an example of why the commission is needed.

Texas GOP official suggests guillotine for Mitt Romney but calls it bad metaphor, not a call for beheading
SREC member from Seguin was angered by Utahan’s criticism of Ted Cruz plan to object when Congress reviews Joe Biden’s win in the Electoral College.
By Todd J. Gillman, The Dallas Morning News, January 3, 2021

“Romney should be introduced to our friend Mr Guillotine.”

The uproar caught the eye of a major French news outlet, News 24, which reported that a “‘Seditious’ Texas GOP official suggests Mitt Romney should be GUILLOTINED for not supporting voter certification challenge.”

The eyes of the world are still upon us including in France where they know about the guillotine as Gillman wrote about in the article. He went on to write:

Echoing Trump’s unproven claims, Harper asserted that “irrefutable” irregularities occurred in Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and Nevada. About 60 state and federal courts have rejected such claims..

“We are proud that Senator Ted Cruz is leading the charge, but the Texas GOP expects all those who represent Texas or the rule of law to be standing with him, whether they are in the US House or Senate. This is no time for Sunshine Patriots,” Harper wrote.

Harper is why soul-sellers like Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz should be part of the commission.

3. There should be a straight-up vote on the proposed $2000 relief aid. Undoubtedly, the new President will be proposing his own bill to deal the with coronavirus crisis.

4. There should be a commission to study the management and operation of the Federal response to the coronavirus. Suggestion areas of investigation include

The failed management of testing
The failed management of providing PPE
The failed management of vaccine distribution
The abuse of power in silencing, transferring, or firing the medical and science personnel in the Federal government responsible for handling the response to the coronavirus.

These commissions and actions will go a long way to allying the fears and concerns of Americans about the election, the coronavirus, and the future of the country. It will show that it is possible to make America great again.

Depending on how the vote in Georgia plays out, Mitt Romney may potentially have the opportunity to take a leadership role in healing the country. Of course, even if that opportunity presents itself, he may not rise to the occasion to take such a leadership position. Of course, if he doesn’t, who will?

Seven Days in January: This Time It Is Not a Movie

January 3, 2021
by Peter Feinman
What will happen after January 6, 2021?

Back in the 1960s when times were simpler, political thrillers were the rage. Two (fiction) books raised the topic of the end of the United States as we know it. These books were not about nuclear destruction like Failsafe and Dr. Strangelove, but were about homegrown threats: Americans acting to overthrow the government as Americans. The two books were:

Seven Days in May by Fletcher Knebel and Charles Bailey II (1962)
Night of Camp David by Fletcher Knebel (1965).

Seven Days in May became a “major motion picture” with Kirk Douglas and Burt Lancaster, a screenplay by Rod Serling, and was directed by John Frankenheimer who had just directed The Manchurian Candidate (1962). Advise and Consent also had been released in 1962. Those years really a time of political thrillers and intrigue without the violence of White House Down.

Seven Days in May was the story of an attempted military coup by a brilliant and magnetic general. It seemed realistic. The book and movie weren’t that many years after the President Harry Truman/General Douglas MacArthur confrontation. Yet in the nearly 60 years since the book, there has been no such military coup or even threat of one. The one military figure calling for one today is no-integrity Mike Flynn who is not currently on active duty. He also is not secretive about his intentions.

The military seems quite prepared to remain out of politics. It deeply resented being exploited when the Commander in-chief dominated Lafayette Park. It deeply resented being called “my generals.” And it is scared about what the immature child in the body of a man with the emotional maturity of a three-year old who has no conscience, no morals, no ethics, and at best, a very limited and simple-minded knowledge and understanding of the world situation, might do. So unlike many countries throughout the world, We the People can rest easy that the military’s loyalty is to the Constitution and not to the individual who happens to be President.

What will the military do on January 6, 2021? First, how many heavily-armed right-wing militias will heed the call of the President to assemble at the nation’s capital? Second, what will they do when they get there? In part the answer to the second question depends on the answer to the first one. It is reasonable to conclude that the more heavily-armed right-wing militia who show up, the greater the chance of violence outside the Capitol where the elected officials will vote. Will they storm the building as they did the Michigan statehouse? Will there be violence inside the Capitol? Will any elected officials be shot? At this point there is no way to know. We will have to wait and see. What we do know is that if things do get out of hand, the military still cannot intervene to restore order since the Commander in-chief who can give that order is the one behind the violence.

A “Seven Days in May” scenario is not possible.

What about Night at Camp David? In that story, a lunatic president gives into to his own paranoia and conspiratorial fantasies. All around him the adults in the room struggle to prevent him going off the rails and acting on his worst impulses. The deranged President rants about the Deep State (to use the current term) political enemies and imaginary plots against him. He continually rails against Fake News (again to use the current term). It is easy to understand why Vintage re-released the book after the 2016 election. The question the publisher promoted was “What Would Happen if the President of the U.S.A. Went Stark Raving Mad?”

The question raised was not about the President’s ineptitude and incompetence as a manager. The same shortcomings that led to his becoming a serial failure in the business world were on the full display in 2020:

1. his failure to manage the testing for the coronavirus
2. his failure to manage the vaccine distribution
3. his failure to manage the COVID relief bill beyond having a last second hissy fit.

If all he were was incompetent and inept, then we should count our blessings that he didn’t wreak more havoc then he has so far. Fortunately, he lacks the mental necessities and cognitive skills to plan and execute anything as diabolical as in a political thriller.

As it turns out, he doesn’t need to. All these political thrillers involve people who are quite secretive about their motives and actions. The storylines are about the hero who uncovers the truth. He does so despite all the obstacles placed in his way. He then must overcome the shock of believing that a president or general in the United States could do what he seemed to be doing. The hero needs to overcome his disbelief that such people in power could launch a coup.

In the real world, no such duplicity is needed. In the real world with this President, everything is out in the open and on Twitter. He wants to be President for life. He lives in an alternate universe befitting the world of an immature child trying to function in the adult world. Which is a scarier prospect – that he actually believes what he is saying about the rigged election or that he knows he lost fair and square, can’t accept it, and will do everything he can not to become a loser and be removed power? I think after weeks of saying the election was rigged, that he is 2-0, and that he won in a landslide, we should credence to the idea that both he and his followers actually do believe all the bull trump. Trumpican elected officials amazingly cite the Trumpican voter concern that the election was rigged as proof that an investigation is needed to determine whether or not the election was rigged.

Previously, it was hard to imagine an open coup openly arrived at by an incumbent President to remain in power. After all, we are not a Trumphole country, are we? However, the Trump Traitors in the House and the Senate are quite open about their attempted coup. They state their intention publicly and proudly. They have done so for the record in a suit taken to the Supreme Court. They will do so for the record on January 6 or 7 depending on when the debate ends. They do so without any qualms, hesitations, or fears that the attempt to reverse the will of the people expressed in the election will led to repercussions. They think they have nothing to lose through this coup attempt and the scary thought is that they may be right.

The political thrillers from the 1960s got in all wrong. In the real world we have an open coup attempt. How violent the attempt remains to be seen. We won’t actually know until the heavily-armed right wing militias show up January 6 and see what they do.

We also don’t know what will happen after the attempted coup fails. The traitors will remain in office without any penalty. The instigator of the failed coup will remain in office for another two weeks. For now, in his own alternate-reality mind, he can still believe the coup might work. After January 7, it will finally start to sink in that his departure from the White House really is going to happen. For the rest of his life, he will believe the lie that he really won because he needs to believe for his own mental health. But he will know finally on January 7, once and for all, that his days are numbered and the number is small. It will be time to start packing for who knows where. The countdown in days, hours, and minutes until he is gone will be displayed for him to see. The Night of Camp David is about a President who loses his mind. Somewhere between January 7 and January 20 that could happen with no adults in the room to stop him and no one to invoke in the 25th Amendment.

Note: This blog was written on Saturday prior to the criminal phone call by the President of the United States to Georgia and prior to the release of the statement from all 10 living former US defense secretaries. Obviously a followup blog is required.

If the Democrats Didn’t Control the House the 2020 Election Would Be Reversed

December 30, 2020
by Peter Feinman
Will Josh Hawley Succeed where Benedict Arnold and Robert E. Lee failed? (Samuel Corum / Getty Images)

These are times that try men’s souls. And women, too. We are watching in slow motion the United States of America being brought to the brink of ceasing to exist as a single country governed by the Constitution and becoming a divided country with two presidents … once again.

The first effort failed but at a tremendous cost. It took years of fighting, the death of hundreds of thousands, and untold destruction throughout the land to preserve the Union. Ultimately the effort failed to create a single country despite the veneer of having done so. There remain huge swaths of the country where Abraham Lincoln remains persona non grata. Tens of millions of Confederates still prefer Robert E. Lee to him. They now have a president who does as well. The Woke assault on Lincoln expands his rejection creating an even third “country” or division in America. I have repeatedly invoked the possibility that the United States as a single country we know today may not legally exist on July 4, 2026 when it otherwise would be celebrating its 250th birthday. Now we are moving even closer to that fate.

At this point, all that separates the United States from dissolving after January 6, 2021, is the Democratic control of the House. Imagine what would happen on January 6 if the Democrats were not in control of the House. Is there any doubt that if the Democrats did not control the House that the Trumpican House and Senate would vote to reverse the election results and hand the election to their Lord and Savior, the Chosen One, Blessed Be his Name? That is how close we are to becoming a country where regardless of how the people vote, the House and the Senate will determine the winner if one party has the majority in both. Our checks and balances would fail us save for the fact that Democrats did so well in 2018 they could barely hold on in 2020. A few more losses by the Democrats and the Presidential election results would be reversed.

Mitch McConnell’s advice to Trumpican Senators not to support the effort to reverse the election is not based on principle. He did not offer the advice out of his commitment to the democratic process or because no fraud occurred. He did so out of the practical reality that the Democratic-controlled House would not approve anything the Trumpican Senate passed. Therefore the vote was futile.

He also knew it was possible the Trumpicans would not have a Senate majority after the Georgia elections. He knew that Romney and perhaps a very small number of Republicans might oppose the coup attempt. His concern is for 2022, too: Trumpican Senators running for re-election in a Biden presidency will have the label traitor affixed to them. Trumpican Representatives don’t care. The way House districts are configured, these people have little to worry about in terms of backlash as 126 already demonstrated. The situation is different in statewide elections. Being a traitor will help Ron Johnson stave off a challenge or win the Wisconsin primary unopposed but will it help him win the election where the Democrats won in 2020? So the Trumpican Senator votes are for show and to prevent the wrath of the Sore Loser being unleashed upon them.

Consider the prospects for 2024. As repeatedly stated here in these blogs since 2016, there is no Republican Party as the party of Lincoln. It’s dead. Even the Lincoln Project knows there is no hope for taking the party back. They have become Independents or Democrats. If Chris Christie or Larry Hogan want to run as Republicans in 2024, they will have the same chance Bill Weld did in 2020. It’s the Trumpican Party.

Assuming for the moment that THE DONALD does not run in 2024 and only designates his daughter as the Vice Presidential candidate, who will be the Trumpican nominee?

Mike “sold his soul” Pence?
Mike “sold his soul” Pompeo?
Nikki “sold her soul’ Haley?
Ted “sold his soul” Cruz based on the presumption he has one?
Josh “sold his soul” Hawley?

How will Trumpican voters be able to differentiate among the candidates? They all will boast of having sold their soul. The real question is not how will the Trumpican voters decide among this cast of soul-sellers, but who THE DONALD will pick as his heir to run with his daughter. The issue for all the soul-sellers is not to get on the wrong list, the one where the disloyal people go if they fail to be loyal and support the coup. Pence and Pompeo already may be on that list. Pence still has a chance to redeem himself in the eyes of THE DONALD even if the Senate vote fails.

Neil Katyal likes to say that the Vice President on January 6 is like the envelop-opener at an awards ceremony. Yes, you are the Master of Ceremonies, but you have no authority to change the vote totals. You can’t simply say, “I want my favorite movie to win and who cares how the academy voted?” True enough but so what? The Vice President has and will take advantage of the opportunity to let the coup have maximum coverage. He will let Trumpicans throughout the land know that regardless of what the Supreme Court, dozens of judges, the Attorney General, and a host of others have said, the election really was stolen, THE DONALD really won in landslide and the only reason he is not being recognized as the duly elected winner is because Democrats control the House.

That will be the message on January 6th or 7th when the debate is over and the votes have been taken. Depending on how many well-armed Trumpicans have gathered in Washington, that is when all hell will break loose. As in 1861, many states will not recognize the results of the presidential election. In exactly what form they do that remains to be seen.

If the Democrats did not control the House, the election would be reversed, the coup would succeed, and the American experiment would come to an end.

Since Democrats do control the House, the election results will stand but many states as in 1861 will not recognize the authority of the illegitimately-elected President.

After that, all bets are off. Josh Hawley deserves the credit for letting his desire to be President of the United States of American in 2024 jeopardize whether or not there will be a United States of America in 2024 as there is today.

Insanity: From the White House to the San Francisco School System

December 29, 2020
by Peter Feinman
He can't handle the truth

Insanity stalks the land. From sea to shining sea, America is experiencing insanity from those who teach our young to those who guide the ship of state. While one school system launches a microagression on the history of the country, a President leads an assault on democracy. The country is paying a price for the actions of the Woke as well as the White House.

WHITE HOUSE ASYLUM

Insanity Charge #1: James Phillips, an emergency room doctor at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, was removed after publicly criticizing the President’s drive-by around the hospital after his coronavirus diagnosis. His was guilty of the crime of telling the truth in a world where it is forbidden.  On the occurrence of this motorcade showoff by the Covid-19 infected President, Phillips said:

The risk of COVID19 transmission inside [a vehicle] is as high as it gets outside of medical procedures. The irresponsibility is astounding. My thoughts are with the Secret Service forced to play. Every single person in the vehicle during that completely unnecessary Presidential ‘drive-by’ just now has to be quarantined for 14 days. They might get sick. They may die. For political theater. Commanded by Trump to put their lives at risk for theater. This is insanity.

Insanity Charge #2: The New York Post frontpage cover calling on the Sore Loser to “STOP THE INSANITY.” The Murdoch-owned paper charged him with “cheering for an undemocratic coup.” The image of him is of a deposed leader spending his final days in office threatening to burn it all down. He is an anarchist holding the match.

There are other images paralleling his actions which have been brought to light recently as lessons from history – and we all know how he is an avid reader of history. How else would he know that Joe Biden is the worst Presidential candidate in the history of the United States? Nero fiddling while Rome burns and Marie Antoinette exclaiming “Let them eat cake.”  One might add “Après moi, le deluge,” for his predictions on the fate that awaits America after January 20, 2021, and “L’état, c’est moi” to draw on Louis XV and perhaps Louis XIV of France. Meanwhile people are eagerly awaiting for him to follow in the steps of Louis XVI.

So far the mainstream media has done a horrible job of reporting his final actions. Last week, everyone suddenly faced a temper tantrum of Krakatoa east of Java proportions. The defense bill was vetoed and the Covid 19 relief bill was deemed disgraceful. The media went into overdrive to try to explain these actions. Republican Senators, meaning Mitch McConnell in particular, were put on the spot along with the Georgia Senate incumbents. Why O Why did our immature child president choose to have a hissy fit now and on these items?

The confusion continued over the weekend. Then Lo and Behold. The immature child in the body of an adult with the emotional maturity of a three-year old (per Mary Trump), reversed course. What had been disgraceful had become acceptable. The bill was signed without a whimper or explanation.

Suddenly the media went into a feeding frenzy. What was the whole point of the disgraceful tirade? What had it accomplished? The exact same bill that had been denounced just moments earlier had been signed with nary a peep from the President. The media castigated these actions without any understanding of them.

John Harwood, CNN, loves to talk about the mental and emotional shortcomings of the immature child president. He loves to regale the viewing audience with tales from unnamed sources inside the White House who speak of the President acting like a child, of their having to talk to him as if he were a child. Harwood bemoans the lack of clinical study on the mind of the President. Yet he, like the rest of the media continue to report on him as if he were an adult. Wrong.

HE NEVER ACTS CHILDISH. HE IS A CHILD.

WOULD YOU ASK AN EIGHT YEAR OLD WHY HE HAD A TEMPER TANTRUM?

WOULD YOU ASK AN EIGHT YEAR OLD WHY HE HAD A HISSY FIT?

As the real world closes in, playtime for the President draws to an end. He can see the adult world staring him in the face on January 20 and he is reacting accordingly. He can’t handle the truth. It’s not just his assault on democracy in his coup attempt, it is behavior as a child confronting the reality of what is to come. He responded appropriately.

OH YEAH! OH YEAH! OH YEAH! I’LL SHOW YOU WHO IS BOSS!

That’s all he wanted to do. That’s all he did do. He threw his fit. He had his tantrum. He made himself the center of attention. And that’s it. He never thought about anything else.

The longtime faux Democrat and Clinton supporter doesn’t care what happens to the Georgia incumbents.

He doesn’t care what happens to the Republican Senate majority.

He doesn’t care what happens to the Republican Party.

He doesn’t even care what happens to the American people.

It’s payback time.

His judges failed him.

His generals failed him.

His Vice President failed him.

His Secretary of State failed him.

His Senate Majority Leader whom he just elected failed him.

Republican governors, state officials, and state legislators failed him.

Everyone is weak and disloyal. The only group left he hasn’t admonished are the Trumpicans themselves. That will happen after they don’t show up on January 6.  Only then will it sink in that he has no more options, his coup failed, he has nowhere to go except to Florida where he can’t stay at his club for more than 21 days without violating the law anyway. Lord knows what he might do during those two weeks between the ratification and the inauguration. If we are lucky, the funk he will sink into will be so deep that he won’t wreak anymore havoc. If we are not lucky, it could be the worst two weeks in American history.

WOKE RUN AMOK ON THE LEFT COAST    

Meanwhile, on the other side of the country, the San Francisco School Names Advisory Committee is planning to denounce American history as unworthy of being taught except in the negative. Jeremiah Jeffries, chairman of the renaming committee and a first-grade teacher, said:

Uprooting the problematic names and symbols that currently clutter buildings, streets, throughout the city is a worthy endeavor. Only good can come from the public being reflective and intentional about the power of our words, names and rhetoric within our public institutions.

The committee used the following criteria to identify the 44 school names to be changed:

Anyone directly involved in the colonization of people
Slave owners or participants in enslavement
Perpetrators of genocide or slavery
Those who exploit workers/people
Those who directly oppressed or abused women, children, queer or transgender people
Those connected to any human rights or environmental abuses
Those who are known racists and/or white supremacists and/or espoused racist beliefs.

The list of luminaries who failed to meet the standards include all the Mount Rushmore presidents among others:

Presidents

George Washington High School, first U.S. president
Abraham Lincoln High School, U.S. president
Jefferson Elementary, Thomas Jefferson, U.S. president
Roosevelt Middle School, Theodore or F.D., both U.S. presidents
Monroe Elementary, James Monroe, U.S. president
Herbert Hoover Middle School, U.S. president
McKinley Elementary, William McKinley, U.S. president
Garfield Elementary, James Garfield, U.S. president

American Notables

Paul Revere K-8, American Revolution patriot
Daniel Webster Elementary, U.S. statesman
Dianne Feinstein Elementary, U.S. senator and former S.F. mayor
Francis Scott Key Elementary, composer of “Star Spangled Banner”
John Muir Elementary, naturalist
Robert Louis Stevenson Elementary, author

American Places

Mission High School, Mission Dolores
Presidio Middle School, S.F. military post
Alamo Elementary, a poplar tree or the site of Texas Revolution battle
El Dorado Elementary, mythical City of Gold

plus a lot of California figures.

Presumably, the curriculum will be advised accordingly to reflect the unworthiness of these reprehensible people and places assuming they are even mentioned at all.

The list elicited a response from Senator Ted Cruz:

Abraham Lincoln…George Washington…even Diane friggin’ Feinstein: NONE are woke enough for the America-hating radical Left. This will never stop, until Americans say “ENOUGH!!” and call it out for the ignorant nonsense that it is. This will never stop, until Americans say ‘ENOUGH!!’ and call it out for the ignorant nonsense that it is.

When Ted Cruz who agreed to litigate the attempted coup before the Supreme Court, becomes the voice of reason, something is truly wrong. However, he is right to note that the Democrats have handed the Republicans an issue on a silver platter that Foxhub will denounce incessantly even after it has exhausted the Hunter Biden nepotism.

LESSONS FOR 2024

What does all this mean for 2024? Unfortunately there is insufficient space to address all the issues. Suffice it to say, the Republican Party will struggle to determine if there is life after Trump or if it really is the Trump Party and there is no room for anyone else. Democrats will struggle to control the Woke after watching “Defund the Police” help unravel their hopes for the 2020 election in the Senate, the House, and at the State level. As we begin the preparations for the 250th anniversary of America, the Woke will increasingly up the ante to replace 1776 with 1619 and to denounce all the dead white men who have contributed to American history. So if you are neither Woke nor Trumpican, what do you do, where do you turn, who speaks for you?

White House Down: There Is No Republican Profile in Courage

December 24, 2020
by Peter Feinman
This time the assault is real and led by the President

“White House Down” is a movie about a physical assault on America.

“Tantrum Trump” is about a political and social media assault on America that could become a physical assault on January 6, 2021.

“White House Down” had people who rose to the occasion and became heroes.

“Tantrum Trump” has no profiles in courage, no heroes, no Howard Bakers. The Sore Loser is acting to cement his legacy as the biggest baby in American history, a whining, weenie with no morals, no ethics, and no conscience, who has no objection to destroying the United States even without being actually on the Putin payroll.

Despite this, what’s left of the Republican Party will not act to stop him.

All the way back in October 2019, I wrote a blog Will Mike Pence Become a Profile in Courage? My conclusion then as now is NO!!!!!!!!!!! No matter what he will never invoke the 25th Amendment. He will certify the election of Joe Biden on January 6. But he will do nothing to prevent the savage chaos which will engulf the United States during the last four weeks of his term in office.

Back in June 2020, I wrote a blog Mitch McConnell: Howard Baker (Time to Go) vs Stay the Course (Go Down with the Ship). My conclusion then was that he would stay the course even if it meant going down with the ship. That did not happen on Election Day but it could happen on January 5. Still he will not rise to the occasion no matter what harm the Sore Loser inflicts on the country, the Republican Party, or the Republican Senate Majority.

Remember the talk about his creating an alternate TV network (or show)? What he is really doing is creating an alternate party. He has always been a Trumpican first, last, and only. Now he is not only unhinged, he is unleashed. He sees January 6, 2021, looming before him. He knows the Democrats will support the election of Biden. He knows the Republicans will support the election of Biden. He knows he needs to make sure the number of Republicans left in Congress are too few to override the Trumpicans. He needs Vice President Brown Nose to continue to be for him what he is to Putin.

At long last, some Republicans are finally seeing that the long-time-Democrat-and-Clinton-supporter doesn’t care about the Republican Party. It was only a vehicle which he could hijack for his own needs as he was unable to do with the Democratic Party. His exultation of the loss of Republican Mia Love in the 2018 elections was simply a prelude to what is occurring now. Tom Friedman asks “Will Trump Force Principled Conservatives to Start Their Own Party?” (NYT 12/23/20 print). His answer was, “I Hope So.” Friedman thinks at some point, “some Republicans will say ‘enough.’”  He wrote that before “Krakatoa, East of Java” on the night of 12/23. It still isn’t enough.

We are facing the extraordinary situation of a sitting President openly attacking his “own” party. He is actively undermining his own party. He is doing this now even before he leaves office and relocates to Mar-a-Lago where he can’t legally live anyway. His desire for revenge against still-Senate-Majority-Leader Mitch McConnell trumps any concern for the Georgia Senate elections. He couldn’t care less about those Republican incumbents having to explain why they supported a disgraceful bill. He couldn’t care less about those Republican incumbents having to explain why they oppose a $2000 relief check. He couldn’t care less if those Republican incumbents lose. In fact, when he had his hissy fit, he never even thought about them.

His throwing the Republicans under the bus has produced strange moments in American history. Consider the situation of his chief of staff. A lifetime ago in October, I wrote:

When Marked Down was appointed Chief of Staff, I was very happy. “Why?” you might wonder. In the House of Representatives, Marked Down was one of the fiercest Trumpicans. He was loyal to core. For him, Russia and the Ukraine were hoaxes. He attacked Fake News. He was one of the chief Flying Monkeys defending the Wicked Witch of the White House from any and all witch hunters in any and all witch hunts.

Now he is in meetings with criminals, traitors, and nutcases talking about martial law. If there is one thing Confederates prize above all else it’s the sending of Federal troops into states to seize stuff. It’s like a dream come true for every Confederate and right-wing militia.

Speaking of right-wing militia’s, their moment of truth will soon be upon us. They have been called to action. They have been called to Washington, DC. They have been called to “Stop the Steal.” Back in September, I wrote the blog Will the Militias March on Washington November 4? Obviously I was wrong on the date. I was not thinking about January 6 or all the post-election actions which have transpired. So while the question raised has been answered in an immediate sense, the true issue raised in the blog about the actions the private militias will take has not.

What will they do when all the legal maneuvering comes to an end? For months they incessantly heard about a rigged election. They have heard about the end of the world as they know it if their Lord and Savior, the Chosen One, Blessed Be his Name, is removed from office. They have seen it on Twitter. They have seen it on Foxhub and other stations.  Now the moment of truth has arrived. The clarion call of Sarah Palin to take back the country rings true. Now is the moment. Now is time to act. If not now, when?

Suppose a few hundred armed militia decide to march on Washington. What will the response be?

Suppose a few thousand armed militia decide to march on Washington. What will the response be?

Suppose 250,000 armed militia with motorcycles and trailers packed with provisions pour forth in caravans from around the country and descend on Washington as they did in South Dakota. What will the response be?

Suppose there is a million man march in support of the one person who can save the country. What will the response be?

I have no idea. Who even has the authority to stop an insurrection led by the Commander in Chief? The local police forces could be overwhelmed. Who could stop the private militias from entering the Capitol? The previous actions in the Michigan statehouse are small-scale compared to what potentially could occur. I don’t even begin to know how you map out a defense against caravans of heavily armed private militias descending on Washington especially if they are violating no laws in traveling there. Oh, you say, they don’t have a parade permit as if that would stop thousands of people bent on saving their Savior.

At this point, no one knows what will happen. We don’t know how many will show up?  We don’t know what the impact will be on Representatives and Senators trying to reach the Capitol amidst maybe thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands heavily armed private militias screaming “Stop the Steal! We know where you live.” There is a lot of uncertainty still with two weeks to go and four weeks to go. It’s hard to imagine the situation not getting meaner, uglier, and deadlier as the Sore Loser becomes more and more desperate, more and more unhinged, more and more unchecked since there are no profiles in courage in the Republican Party and no one will rise to the occasion.

 

P.S. Finally, there is the burning question all Americans are asking: When will Rudy get his Christmas pardon?

January 20, 2021: The Closer We Get, the More Deranged He Will Become

December 21, 2020
by Peter Feinman
Sydney Then...

The real world is coming. Moment by moment, minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day, week by week, less than one month away, the real world is coming. The immature child president in the body of an adult with the emotional maturity of a three-year old (thank you Mary Trump), has been unable to stop it. He keeps trying but so far nothing has worked. What will happen as he becomes more and more unraveled?

PLAYING THE CHAVEZ CARD

Sydney Now… (SAUL LOEB/LEO RAMIREZ/AFP/getty images)

Sydney was not the first person to play the Chavez card. It turns out it was played in 2016 even before the election and by the Democrats. The headline in CNN from October 20, 2016 was

Venezuela slams video comparing Donald Trump to Hugo Chavez

A new campaign ad comparing Donald Trump to Hugo Chavez isn’t sitting well with Venezuela’s government. The Democratic National Committee posted a video online this week claiming the Republican presidential nominee’s recent remarks have a lot in common with fiery speeches from the late Venezuelan leader. And it wasn’t long before a top Venezuelan official weighed in, condemning what she called an “atrocious and vile” ad.

Perhaps Chavez was so upset at being compared to the like of Donald Trump that he reached out from the grave to have his revenge. Actually, polls show that Zombies overwhelming prefer Trump to Biden. The irony is that if Sydney does investigate dead people voting she will find that it helped her candidate. There is no valid reason for assuming dead people prefer Biden.

ACTIONS TAKEN SO FAR

Meanwhile back in the real world, as of the winter solstice when the day is shortest and the darkness is longest, here is what the Sore Loser has done to stop the world he doesn’t want to get off of:

Ukrainian extortion attempt – failed
Post Office delivery sabotage – failed
Delay date of election – failed
Bad-mouth mail-in voting – backfired
Vote recounts – failed
Legal fraud voting cases – failed
Alternate state electors – failed
Supreme Court – not loyal to him
Undermine Electoral College – failed.

The one remaining legal deadline is the January 6, 2021, Congressional ratification. He continues to work with a small group of traitors in the House of Representatives to reverse the election. So far the one possible and required Senate supporter would be the biggest moron in the Senate except he has not yet taken office. Perhaps he should have worn a football helmet so he wouldn’t have taken so many blows to the head. He probably doesn’t wear a mask either. At this point, it seems likely that the traitors will try something on January 6 and the result will be a complete and total failure.

Wait! There’s more. In the ongoing effort to turn back the tide of history, the Sore Loser has scraped the bottom of the barrel. He has assembled the worst collection of reprobates he can find; in other words, his kind of people. The desperate ploy is to declare martial law, seize voting machines and redo the elections in the states that he lost because this time he thinks he would win. And when would these elections be held? Next November and he would just in office until then? Whether those redos will include Senators, Representatives, Governors, and all state and local elections remain unclear. Perhaps the massive fraud was so calibrated as to only affect the Presidential vote and only in states that he lost. While this Hail Mary will not succeed it does raise some interesting questions.

1. How did Michael Flynn ever get as far as he did in the military given his lack of integrity and his lack of loyalty to the Constitution?
2. How come Sydney Powell and Rudy Giuliani are still lawyers? Are there no standards?

POST-JANUARY 6, 2021 ACTIONS

What will happen post-January 6, 2021, as the clock keeps ticking and he has no options left except to pout and stay in the White House?

1. White House staff will begin to clean out their desks.
2. White House staff will begin to look for other jobs.
3. There will more Bill Barrs – people who are now willing to publicly speak the truth. How about all those anonymous sources the White House reporters keep referring to or will they want to save it for their books as Bolton did?
4. The First Lady will be packed – I am not familiar with the details of the moving protocols for people leaving and entering the White House. Surely the packing of the present occupants can’t wait until the last minute. Someone will contact the First Lady in accordance with standard protocol to begin the process of packing her possessions and shipping them somewhere. Where? To Florida or New York? Apparently according to the stipulations for the operation of Mar-a-Lago as a club, no one can live there as a permanent resident. One can anticipate a law suit being brought against anyone who tries to. That means most likely the former First Lady will choose to live in New York.
5. The people responsible for packing the outgoing President will also inquire about packing his belongings and shipping them somewhere so he will have them on the night of January 20, 2021…unless he is in custody in which case he will have prison attire and minimal possessions. Would you want to be the person who asks him about the packing?
6. Around the same time, Biden will measure the drapes. As one team is moved out, another team is moved in.

There are two new legal proceedings to track now. One as mentioned will be when the Sore Loser is confronted with the reality that he can remain in Mar-a-Lago only for a short time. Naturally he will violate the agreement leading to a lawsuit. The second is as a material witness in the lawsuits brought by the election equipment companies trashed by Foxhub and others for participating in a rigged election.

All this means there is still a lot to look forward to in horror. The attempt to declare martial law shows there is no limit as to what he would attempt to do to reverse the election. It also shows there are limits as to what is able to do. Still he will keep trying up to the very last moment. If all he ends up doing is pardoning the members of his criminal family then we should count our blessings that he didn’t do anything else to destroy the country in his final days.

PUTIN UPDATE

Back on July 19, 2020, I concluded my blog Putin’s Pence: What Does He Get from the Relationship?

Putin undoubtedly realizes that the time of his Pence as President may be nearing an end. He can read briefing reports. Putin’s window of opportunity for exploiting the complicit President is closing. What will he do before his Pence leaves office? Will he seek a final hurrah when he knows the United States will not respond? Invade the Baltics? Given the weaknesses of his own country, there may be limits to what he can do. When all is said and done, this brief interlude when his Pence presided over the United States may be remembered as the time when an immature child in the body of an adult desperate for the approval of his dominating father tried to the best of his ability to help make Russia great again.

Now we know what Putin did and how his asset responded.

The Texas Secession: Legally Dividing America

December 14, 2020
by Peter Feinman
Why he fights so hard

This report on America’s ongoing Third Civil War is being conducted through The Atlantic time capsule issue from December 2019 entitled: “How to Stop a Civil War.” The initial blog covered Editor Jeffrey Goldberg’s explanation for the issue and David Frum’s Dispatch from the electoral front-lines as he saw it back in 2019. The world has changed a lot since then.

Moving though the magazine, the next article is “The Secessionist” by Graeme Wood. It was based on interviews with Daniel Miller, the leader of the Texas Nationalist Movement. He wanted to divorce Texas from the Union once and for all. Now here we are a year later and the called for secession has moved from a magazine article to a national event. The change now has been the extension for the call for a single state to a broader secession involving all the states that had joined in the unsuccessful coup to steal the 2020 presidential election.

In The Atlantic article, Wood cites a claim of membership of 300,000 for the Texas Nationalist Movement. That seems like a significant number. The goal was for there to be a referendum in Texas on secession. Miller called the movement “Texit” based on the action in Britain. Left unmentioned were two related possibilities:

1. a referendum by the other 49 states on whether they (we) want to kick Texas out of the country regardless of how Texas voted.
2. dividing the state into the portions that wanted out from the portions that wanted in somewhat as Virginia had divided at the onset of the Second Civil War into West Virginia and Virginia.

If option #2 is taken, then even if portions of Texas vote to secede, the pro-American citizens can remain part of the country. That way, there could two Texases: one an independent country and one a state in the United States. There was no indication what Miller thought about these options.

Miller proposed a new country which would be the tenth largest economy in the world. He favored a cordial uncoupling with a largely undefended border with the United States (no mention of a wall with Mexico). He expected that the border between the United States and Texas would be like that between the United States and Canada. The key would be the independence of Texas where it would now be in charge of its own political decisions. And it would accept the consequences of those decisions as well.

Miller claims the right of self-determination. It is a right the United States supposedly supports in locations throughout the world. Now it is time to do so at home. He feels that if Americans see that the second largest state in the country declares that it was participating in the union under protest that the request could not be ignored. Apparently he is anticipating if not a 100% Texan support for secession at least a landslide. There is no indication in the article in what if any is his cutoff point for secession. As noted above, what if self-determination for a significant number of people means they want to remain American. Miller did not address this issue in the article although it is possible he has elsewhere.

As mentioned, this article was last December. What has happened this December? First the Texas Attorney General led the unsuccessful coup attempt to overturn the presidential election of 2020. This action does not comport with Miller’s expression of seceding because he does not want Texas to be governed by others. Now the Texas Attorney General was seeking to tell four other states what to do. How would Miller like it if other states petitioned the Supreme Court for Texas and other states to end voter suppression, end gerrymandering, and end the one drop-off location per county for early voters as a violation of the civil rights of Texans? I suspect Miller would not like such interference in Texas affairs even as his state sought unsuccessfully to interfere in the voting of other states.

Following the decision of the Supreme Court, the Texas GOP acted

Austin, TX, Release: December 11, 2020. For Immediate Release

Below is Chairman Allen West’s statement regarding the decision by the Supreme Court to dismiss Texas’ constitutionally legitimate and critical lawsuit.

“The Supreme Court, in tossing the Texas lawsuit that was joined by seventeen states and 106 US congressman, has decreed that a state can take unconstitutional actions and violate its own election law. Resulting in damaging effects on other states that abide by the law, while the guilty state suffers no consequences. This decision establishes a precedent that says states can violate the US constitution and not be held accountable. This decision will have far-reaching ramifications for the future of our constitutional republic. Perhaps law-abiding states should bond together and form a Union of states that will abide by the constitution.”

The Texas GOP will always stand for the Constitution and for the rule of law even while others don’t.

This is not the place to attempt to unravel the workings of the mind of Allen West or the place he is trying to carve out for himself in Texas politics. So far I am not aware of Miller or any Texas officials jumping on the Texas secession bandwagon either alone or with the other “law-abiding states.”

Still there are consequences to voicing out loud thoughts you never should have had in the first place. For example, Rush Limbaugh said the “US is ‘trending towards secession’ and there can’t be ‘peaceful coexistence’ between conservatives and liberals. It can’t go on this way. There cannot be a peaceful coexistence of two completely different theories of life.” Immediately afterwards he was forced to backtrack his comments. Limbaugh pretended he was echoing other people’s opinions rather than advocating for secession himself. It is quite possible he was a victim of his own rash impulsiveness. He just blurted out what felt good without thinking of the consequences just like the impulsive President.

While what Miller advocates is not significant, when the GOP Chair of a major state voices secession talk, it is more serious. Don’t be surprised to quietly see him disappear after the New Year.

The Supreme Court has punctured the hot-air balloons of the hothead traitors. The backlash has already started. The Orlando Sentinel has apologized for endorsing one of the Trump Traitors in the recent election:

We had no idea, had no way of knowing at the time that Walz was not committed to democracy… During our endorsement interview with the incumbent congressman, we didn’t think to ask, “Would you support an effort to throw out the votes of tens of millions of Americans in four states in order to overturn a presidential election and hand it to the person who lost…Our bad.

The paper vowed to ask such questions in the future.

Rep. Paul Mitchell, Michigan, has left the Republican Party. He was retiring so it doesn’t amount to much.

Smartmatic, the voting technology company that has been attacked by the various Trump networks has struck back. It “demands a full and complete retraction of all false and defamatory statements and reports published by Fox News. This retraction must be done with the same intensity and level of coverage that you used to defame the company in the first place.” Obviously that is not going to happen. Smartmatic is reserving its legal right to pursue possible defamation claims against Fox News, One America News, and Newsmax. There is a financial price to pay for simply making things up unless you are the President of the United States. How many pardons will have to be issued to protect his networks?

Now suppose in 2022, you are the daughter of the Sore Loser and you are asked in your Senate race: “Do you think Joe Biden got away with a rigged election in 2020?” How will you answer that? “What did you do to stop the attempted coup?” How will you answer?

The shell-shocked Trump Traitors who are in silence now will not be able to remain in silence forever. They can expect their efforts to overturn the election will be part of the attack on them in the 2022 elections. Representative Adam Kinzinger who did not participate in the attempted coup, instead tweeted:

[T]he Supreme Court is not part of the deep state… Complaining and bellyaching is not a manly trait, it’s actually sad. Real men accept a loss with grace.

Our immature-child President is not a real man and cannot accept a loss with grace. Instead America’s biggest baby has put all his children who want to be Senators and/or President on the spot. He has put Mike “sold his soul” Pence, Mike “sold his soul second Trump term” Pompeo, Nikki “sold her soul” Haley, and Ted “sold his soul” Cruz on the spot as well. What will they say about their failure to resist the attempted coup in 2020 or even to abet it? What will they say about their willingness to accept the vote in 2024?

The irony of the secession talk of like-minded states is that the Sore Loser would be perfectly willing to accept the United States dividing into two if he could be President for life in one half and there was no extradition to the other half.

America’s Third Civil War: An Update

December 13, 2020
by Peter Feinman
America's Third Civil War (The Atlantic)

America’s Third Civil War is unfolding in unexpected ways. Previously I had blogged that the 2020 Presidential election would be our Battle of Gettysburg (He Really Could Stand in the Middle of 5th Avenue, Shoot Somebody, and Not Lose Voters 4/1/20) . It would be the moment when the conflict between the two sides of the Culture Wars burst forth with some violence over which side had triumphed in the showdown at high November. In many ways, such a showdown has occurred but without the violence…yet.

In the more than one month since Joe Biden won, although the results were not immediately known, the fighting has transpired primarily in the court room. In these clashes, the hero of 9/11 has made a dripping fool of himself time and time again without having any awareness of his predicament… except that he knows enough that he will need a pardon.

One surprising absence from the war has been the current Attorney General. After months and years of doing the biding of the criminal in-chief, when the final showdown came he was missing in action. In fact, he gave aid to the patriots who were defending the country from the assault on democracy by denying that the election was rigged or that fraud had occurred.

With these thoughts in mind, I am taking a trip down memory lane to one year ago: the December 2019 issue of The Atlantic with the cover title “How to top a Civil War.” Since the war is not yet over and 2021 promises to be even worse as the new President struggles to assert himself as THE President of the United States, it is worth taking a look back on what was written.  In a preview to the next blog, I note the article in this time capsule on Texas and secession could just have easily been written in December 2020 as December 2019. I am waiting to see what happens before writing about it.

A NATION COMING APART BY JEFFREY GOLDBERG

Goldberg tactfully opens his “Editor’s Note” with:

The 45th president of the United States of America is uniquely unfit for the office and poses a multifaceted threat to our country’s democratic institutions.

Truer words were never written, but I suspect they understate the problem. I doubt that Goldberg anticipated a frontal assault on the democratic process including an attempted coup to steal the election with the support of the Minority Leader of the House of Representatives and 125 accomplices. To imagine an attempted coup by this particular President requires no stretch of the imagination. To see how widespread the support was and is would have been unimaginable. These 126 traitors are from the present House of Representatives. It is quite likely that in the new House where the Democrats will have only the slimmest of margins, that the number of representatives who support the President in-exile will be even greater. There is no margin of error.

Goldberg went on to write:

The structural failures in our democratic system that allowed a grifter into the White House in the first place⸺this might be our greatest challenge.

I strongly doubt that Goldberg anticipated that the con artist only needed to ask for money to receive over $200 million from his Trumpican base. That is an astonishing achievement in the history of scam annals. He has perfected the ability to raise enormous sums of money in small amounts without having to fleece few bigtime marks.

Finally, Goldberg announced as the editor, the purpose for the special issue.

Out of our conversations, and others like it, emerged the idea for the special issue you are now reading, what we have called “How to Stop a Civil War.” … (W)e worry that the ties that bind us are fraying at alarming speed⸺we are becoming contemptuous of each other in ways that are both dire and possibly irreversible.

If these words reflect Goldberg’s assessment of the situation in December 2019, then one can only imagine what he must think in December 2020. For now the coup to steal the election temporarily has been stopped by the Supreme Court. One should expect the final stand where the last ditch effort to overturn the election will be undertaken will be when the new House convenes to ratify the vote of the Electoral College. He still thinks he can overturn the election and has roughly 126 people who will help him. The fat lady still hasn’t sung yet.

“WHEN TRUMP GOES” BY DAVID FRUM

The opening article in the war issue appropriately enough was called “Dispatches.” It was listed as the “Opening Argument.” The question raised was “Somehow, sometime, he will leave office. Will our politics get better or worse?”

Frum opened his argument with the well-known examples of the current occupant’s preference to remain in office beyond the two-term limit. By now you would have to be dumb beyond belief not to realize that is his desire. I am not suggesting he has a plan to do it, only that he would like to. Plan B I would guess is to run in 2024 and then to be succeeded by a child, probably Ivanka as the first female president. It would follow her stint as Senator from Florida beginning in 2022 where she is now relocating. For all we know, she will be the preferred Trump in 2024. Whether all that happens or not remains to be seen. What is clear is that the Trumps will be with us for years to come with a strong base in the House that will do whatever he wants.

In his Argument, Frum presents two scenarios: a narrow Democratic victory or a big Democratic victory. We know now that the latter did not occur. It did not occur in the House. It did not occur in the Senate even if they win the two runoff elections. It did not occur at the state level. Even though Joe Biden won with the same landslide Electoral College vote as in 2016 only with the parties reversed and by over 7 million votes, the Democrats’ hopes were not fulfilled.

Frum’s analysis in 2019 misses two key considerations, one of which he could not have known about.

First, the coronavirus changed all political calculations. Without the coronavirus it is quite possible there would have been another election where the Democrats won the popular vote but lost the election. Without the coronavirus there really could have been a second term.  Even with the virus, what would have happened if the vaccine had been discovered sooner? What would have happened if the coronavirus had happened a year earlier? We will never know the answer to these different scenarios, but there is one chilling fact that will haunt historians for years to come:

Did 200,000 Americans have to die in 2020 for him to be defeated that same year?

Try and imagine what it would be like to participate in that debate.  Are those deaths the price America had to pay to make him a one-term president?

Second, Joe Biden probably is the only Democratic candidate who could have won. In a previous blog, I asked the question if Elizabeth Warren could have won. We will never know but the odds are she easily might have lost despite the coronavirus. Even more so for the other potential Democratic candidates.

Frum couldn’t possibly have known any of this when he wrote his Dispatch from the battlefield last December. In hindsight we can see how the stars had to be aligned to produce the Democratic presidential victory in 2020 and there is no guarantee that they will be so aligned in 2024.

So what will happen now?

As in America’s Second Civil War, we will have two Presidents: one in Washington and one in the South. The parallel is not the same. This time the President in the south commands no armies and the only revenue he raises will be for himself. During the Second Civil War, the Confederates removed themselves from the political process. They did not remain in Congress or vote in the 1864 elections. This time Trump’s traitors will remain in Congress without suffering any punitive actions for their attempted coup to steal the election. Their loyalty will be to the rightful President in Florida and not to the Constitution or the illegitimate President in Washington.

The ongoing war then is more likely to resemble World War I than the Second Civil War but without the violence. By that I mean, everything in Congress will be trench warfare with neither side budging. Trumpicans will not accept Joe Biden as the President of their country.  They will call upon their governors to do the same … unless the state needs federal aid due to a disaster.  Care to guess to whom the Governor of South Dakota will pledge her loyalty?

America’s Third Civil War is far from over. It will continue as long as the two houses live together in one political entity. Texas has a solution for that.

 

2024 – Will It Be a William Jennings Bryan Threepeat?

December 8, 2020
by Peter Feinman
"William Jennings Bryan" loses another one (wikiwand.com)

Will the 2024 presidential election provide an opportunity for the outgoing President for a threepeat? In the history of the two-party system, few people have been presidential candidates three times. Henry Clay was during the first half of the 19th century but both before and after the Second Party system dominated. Franklin Roosevelt ran four times, all successfully. But the fate of the three-time candidates varied.

THREE-TIME CANDIDATES

When it comes to three-time candidates, William Jennings Bryan, the Democratic Party nominee for President, set the standard.

In 1896, received 46.7% of the vote.
In 1900, with Adlai Stevenson I as his running mate, he received 45.5% of the vote.
In 1908, he received 43% of the vote.

Bryan thus has the distinction of receiving under 50% on the popular vote on three occasions and being a three-time loser, an American record in the two-party system.

Previously Grover Cleveland held the record. He received 48.9% in 1884 when he won, 48.6% in 1888 when he lost to Benjamin Harrison who had received fewer votes, and 46% in 1892 when he won in a three-way race and with Adlai Stevenson I as his running mate. So in contrast to Bryan, he won two of the three times he ran and a third-party candidate skewed the totals.

Richard Nixon is the remaining three-time candidate. He twice received under 50% of the vote, first with 49.6% in 1960 to John Kennedy when he lost and then with 43.4% in 1968 when he won against Hubert Humphrey with George Wallace as the third-party candidate. He also ran for third time in 1972 and won with 60.7%, a remarkably high number. Of course, he didn’t finish that term.

Since then, no person has been a major party candidate three times.

At this point in time, it seems unlikely that the three living two-time presidents will run again. That means one and only one person has a chance to join the exclusive club. He could join Bryan as failing to reach 50% of the popular vote all three times. He could join Cleveland or Nixon as being a two-time winner and also receiving under 50% of the popular vote twice or on all three occasions as Bryan had.

TWO-TIME CANDIDATES

Another possibility is to quit now and not even try to be a three-time candidate. He still would join a select presidential group.

Woodrow Wilson won twice with under 50% in 1912 and 1916 with Teddy Roosevelt providing formidable third-party opposition in 1912.

Thomas Dewey lost twice with under 50% of the vote, first to Franklin Roosevelt in 1944 with 45.9% of the vote and then to Harry Truman in 1948 with 45.1%

Adlai Stevenson II lost twice with 44.3% in 1952 to Dwight Eisenhower and then again in 1956 with 42%. He sought but did not win the 1960 nomination.

Since then no major party candidate has received under 50% of the vote twice until the current President who won with 46.1% in 2016, less than the loser Mitt Romney had received in 2012, and lost in 2020 with 46.8%, a small improvement.

Stevenson presents another possibility: to try for a third-time nomination and fail to receive it. If he tried in 2024 and failed, there always would be the option of running as a third-party candidate.

I present this information because as everybody knows, the outgoing President is an avid American historian. He knew that his foe in 2020 was the worst presidential candidate in American history. He knew that the 2012 Republican candidate was the worst presidential candidate in American history before that. He knew that the 2016 Democratic candidate was the worst Secretary of State in American history. He knew that NAFTA was the worst trade agreement in American history. He knew that Abraham Lincoln was a Republican when hardly anybody knew that. And he was the first to realize that George Washington secured the airports thus paving the way to American victory in the American Revolution.

He certainly has more of an historical sense than his predecessor! So it is only natural that he would want to be in the Presidential Loser Hall of Fame by coming in under 50% for the third time.

WE ARE NOT BELARUS

There has been a lot of talk about the percentage of Trumpicans who accept the scam that the election was rigged. Numbers like 70% have been bandied about from polls and we all know how accurate the polls are. But this number is deceptive. There is a difference between “wouldn’t it be swell if your candidate really won” and “let’s overthrow the government.” We have had the opportunity in Belarus and in Trump-hole countries to see how people can take to the streets when they think an election has been stolen from them. So far, at least, nothing remotely comparable has happened here.

– There was a demonstration with the chant “Fox Sucks” when Fox correctly but early called Arizona for Joe Biden.
– There was a small show of force in Washington on behalf of the Sore Loser but nothing significant.
– There have been big rallies in Georgia by Trumpicans against the Republican state officials and even calling for Trumpicans not to vote in the upcoming Senate elections.

I am not sure if any of these actions count as a groundswell to reverse the rigged election. Think back to what he prophesied in March, 2019:

I have the support of the police, the support of the military,
the support of the Bikers for Trump⸺I have tough people,
but they don’t play tough until they go to a certain point,
and then it would be very bad, very bad.

Have you seen the Bikers for Trump turnout to stop the steal? Maybe they learned their lesson from South Dakota.  Now the Arizona GOP has thrown down the gauntlet.

“I am willing to give my life for this fight,” tweeted Ali Alexander, an organizer of the movement.

“You’re asking people to die for this conspiracy theory? What in the living hell is wrong with you people?” tweeted Arizona state senator Martín Quezada.

“I agree. This is the hill to die on,” one respondent said. “IM WILLING TO GIVE MY LIFE,” wrote another.

Various individuals like past-his-prime Dobbs, no-integrity Flynn, and the “Hugo Chavez” lawyer have called for drastic action worthy of Seven Days in May. It doesn’t look like any of these actions will amount to anything. After all, why fight for victory in the Georgia Senate elections if Vice President Mike Pence will cast the deciding vote in the second administration promised by Mike Pompeo?

CLEANSING THE PARTY OF REPUBLICANS

Remember Mia “Didn’t feel the” Love? Remember how he cheered when she was defeated in her re-election bid in 2018? Cleansing the Party of disloyal traitors was more important than holding the House.

Remember Jeff Flake who stepped down as Senator in Arizona? Now Arizona has two Democratic Senators putting control of the House at risk. Cleansing the Party of disloyal traitors was more important than holding the Senate.

Remember how much fun it was ridiculing John McCain? Now Arizona voted Democratic for President for the first time since the Creation.

Loyalty to one person trumps all other considerations. That means it is open season now on any Republicans who were loyal to the law and not to him. They are RINOs says the longtime fake Democrat and Clinton supporter. It seems that on the state level there are people who have not yet sold their soul as the Republican Senators excluding Romney have. Even people who have ambitions of their own still cower before the immature child. The elections have shown that there still are Republicans at the state level meaning people who are ready to move forward once the Sore Loser leaves the stage.

THE WAR BETWEEN REPUBLICANS AND TRUMPICANS

The question now for Republicans is do they want their party back? Sarah Palin called on Republicans in 2008 to take back their country. It seems quite likely that for all the talk about demography being destiny, the Democrats have maxed out on identity politics. There is a limit as to how many votes they can receive with a motto of “Defund the Police.” The progressive wing will be a constant headache for Joe Biden for the next four years. There is an ample opportunity for Republicans to get back in the Presidential game if they can dump the Sore Loser for an adult who can tell the truth and is not drowning in lawsuits due to his criminal life.

On the other hand, maybe Republicans will fail to take back their party, the Trumpicans will prevail, and William Jennings Bryan will have company as a three-time presidential candidate who never received 50% of the popular vote.

Impeach, Indict, Investigate or Ignore?: This Is Not a Gerry Ford Situation

November 30, 2020
by Peter Feinman
"I will be the hero!" (The Atlantic interview 9/26/19)

President Gerry Ford is back in the news… and not in a Chevy Chase way. He is in the news because of an act he did to heal the nation: he pardoned a President who had resigned in disgrace. That action is hailed as a way of moving forward from our current impeached president and sore loser today. Biden is asked not to inflict any more emotional turmoil and angst on an exhausted country that wants the nightmare to end and life to get back to normal.

Unfortunately we are not living in a Gerry-Ford moment.

This time the President was impeached.
This time the President has not admitted guilt or even conceded that he lost the election.
This time the President is planning to be politically active after he leaves office.
This time the President is planning to run again.
This time the President has a cult following who will continue to accept him as their Lord and Savior, the Chosen One, Blessed Be his Name for the indefinite future.
This time the President has $421 million in debts to pay.
This time the President is facing multiple lawsuits and indictments.
This time the President is an immature child and sore loser.
This time the President is creating the “Stop the Steal” myth as the new “Lost Cause.”

As a country we don’t have the option of putting our heads in sand and pretending the most corrupt President in the history of United States is part of our past. Who knows what parting gifts he will give the alpha-male who dominates him as part of the effort to Make Russia Great Again.

What then should We the People do? Last July, I wrote (Who Will Be Biden’s Attorney General?):

If Joe Biden is sworn in as the new President, where will the former President be at that moment? He will not be there to watch the sleepy-creepy-corrupt person who has lost his mental faculties take office. It will be difficult enough for the current President to accept the concept that THE DONALD is a loser. Especially if he is a loser to someone who received more than 306 Electoral College votes… He will not have the image of him as a loser become a defining one for him.

Well, Biden didn’t receive more Electoral votes than THE DONALD had in 2016 but he did receive 6 million votes than THE LOSER did in 2020. As gratifying as it might be to handcuff the Sore Loser on the golf course on January 20, 2021, or before he announces his candidacy for 2024, that action probably is not the best way to go. It is better to take it one step at a time and build a public case rather than to abruptly dive into the depths of his depravity the moment he leaves the White House for good. Ironically, 2021 may be remembered as the year the American people gained their immunity and the year the Sore Loser lost his.

STEP 1 RELEASE THE DOCUMENTS

During the various hearings and investigations, Congress requested documents be released. For the most part, the Criminal in-chief declined to do so and instructed all employees in the Executive branch of the government not to comply with the duly authorized subpoenas or requests. President Biden should publicly release all such documents except when there are national security concerns. Those security documents should only be released to the Congressional committees or Department of Justice. Considering how narrow the Democratic majority is, the House may not be the best venue for discovering the truth.

STEP 2 INTERVIEW THE PEOPLE

During the various hearings and investigations, Congress subpoenaed people to testify. For the most part, the Criminal in-chief declined to allow them to do so and instructed all employees in the Executive branch of the government not to comply with the duly authorized requests. The people who were willing to cooperate and were prevented from doing so should be interviewed in this step. This also includes people such as Inspectors General who have lost their jobs. The people here will not need to be subpoenaed because they are willing and eager to talk. They may even have written books about their experiences in the White House. The testimony of these people in conjunction with the documents released in Step 1 will help build a public case in the effort to determine what really happened.

STEP 3 INTERVIEW THE PARDONED PEOPLE

In that same July 2019 blog, I wrote:

If he resigns an hour before so his Vice President who is now President can pardon him, he is still subject to state law. He also still can be subpoenaed for investigations at the federal level. That means he will subject to contempt charges if he is a no-show and be confronted with a perjury trap if he does.

Now with the Flynn pardon and more to come, we are moving beyond the theoretical to the actual. This admonition applies to any and all pardoned people including himself if he deploys the Pence maneuver. The information gathered in Steps I and 2 mean the people who don’t want to tell the truth have lost the option of pleading the Fifth Amendment. Some of them still won’t tell the truth in the hope that they never will be indicted, convicted, sentenced, and jailed. Still they all should be required to testify.

STEP 4 INTERVIEW THE UNPARDONED AND UNCOOPERATIVE PEOPLE    

Theoretically, this category could include the former Vice President, the former Attorney General, the former Secretary of State, the former Postal Inspector, former multiple people from Homeland Security, the still-current son-in-law, the Fox triplets, and who knows how many others. These people may take the Fifth. That is why it is essential to go through Steps 1-3 first to lay the groundwork for the testimony of these people.

There should be a standing invitation to the Sore Loser to testify under oath at any time he wants.

The purposes of the investigations are twofold:

1. To determine for the record what actually happened.
2. To determine what regulatory and legal changes are needed so they can’t happened again.

The purpose is not to indict people except when they lie under oath.

The areas to be covered are:

1. Russian collusion and submission to Putin.
2. The cover-up including related obstruction and abuse of power in the previous investigations.
3. Ukrainian extortion.
4. The cover-up including related obstruction and abuse of power in the impeachment.
5. The assault on the election process both before and after the election.
6. The incompetence and ineptitude in the management of the coronavirus pandemic.

The actions identified under #1 may be considered treasonous. That will be determined when the investigation is complete. Technically the assault on the democratic process, the rule of law, and freedom of the press are not acts of treason done on behalf of foreign adversaries even if those actions aid his once-hoped-for business partners Russia and China. Still We the People need to know what happened. I will leave it to others to determine what to call these actions to undermine the United States of America.

This investigation will provide an opportunity for Rudy Giuliani to rise to the occasion. He said in an interview with The Atlantic in September 2019:

“It is impossible that the whistle-blower is a hero and I’m not. And I will be the hero! These morons—when this is over, I will be the hero. “I’m not acting as a lawyer. I’m acting as someone who has devoted most of his life to straightening out government,” he continued, sounding out of breath. “Anything I did should be praised …. You should be happy for your country that I uncovered this.”

Once upon a time nearly 20 years ago, Giuliani was an American hero. Like those high-school athletes remembering their glory days, he has been trying desperately to regain that status to the point where he has become a joke. He has one last chance to be the hero. I doubt he will take it even when subpoenaed to testify.