Thursday, October 31, 2019

Either/Or


So it's either "regime cleavage," a condition in which:

Instead of seeking office to change the laws to obtain preferred policies, politicians who oppose the democratic order ignore the laws when necessary to achieve their political goals, and their supporters stand by or even endorse those means to their desired ends. 

Which exists today because:

Today, when Trump refuses to comply with the House impeachment inquiry, he makes plain his indifference to the Constitution and to the separation of powers. When Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell argues that impeachment overturns an election result, he is doing the same. In the minds of Trump, his allies and, increasingly, his supporters, it’s not just Democrats but American democracy that is the obstacle.

Or maybe it's something else:


A majority of Americans say President Donald Trump has little to no respect for America’s democratic institutions and traditions, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

The issue strikes at the heart of the House impeachment inquiry into Trump, which is focused in part on whether he used his office to seek a foreign government’s help for personal political gain. Sixty-one percent of Americans, including 26% of Republicans, say Trump lacks respect for democratic norms. Similar shares of Republicans are also critical of the president’s honesty and his discipline.

Yet the majority of Republicans — 85% — are supportive of Trump’s job in office. Overall, 42% of Americans approve of Trump’s handling of the job, in line with where he has been throughout his tenure. Just 7% of Democrats have a positive view of Trump as president.

Trump’s job approval rating and other markers in the survey underscore the deeply divisive nature of his presidency, with Republicans largely favoring his actions and Democrats overwhelmingly disapproving. As Trump eyes his reelection campaign, it suggests his path to victory will hinge on rallying higher turnout among his core supporters as opposed to persuading new voters to back his bid for a second term.

But this analysis rests on Stalin's question:  how many supporters does Trump have?  If they all turned out in 2016, and the Democrats can turn out their base in 2020 (as they did in 2018), who wins?  Trump's national approval rating is holding fairly steady, but we don't elect Presidents by national ballot, we do it by states.  His approval rating in the states is what matters, and in many states where it counts, he's down or sinking.  42% nationally is where Trump has been since two months into his term.  He's gone down below that, a little above it, but he's never improved on it.  Is he steady and true?  Or is he just treading water?  85% of Republicans may approve of Trump, but how many voters in which states is that?  Enough to carry the electoral college again?  Probably not.

Newt Gingrich didn't show much respect for democratic institutions or traditions, either.  It's the primary reason he forced an impeachment of Bill Clinton.  Clinton survived and Gingrich was driven from office.  But he came in thumbing his nose at House traditions and setting himself up to be King when he took the Speaker's office.  He did a great deal more damage than his tenure in Congress, though, because he turned the GOP into what it is today.  The odds of a third party rising out of the carcass of the current GOP seem fairly strong, as many conservative (arch-conservative by '70's standards) GOP voices are decrying Trump and his Congressional support more loudly every day.

Are we seeing a regime change?  Or the collapse of the Whigs, which lead to the formation of the Republican party almost 150 years ago?

Maybe it's about time.

Five Thirty Eight today reports 48% approval for impeachment of Trump.   To put that in context with Nixon's resignation, opposition to impeachment, and support for it, crossed each other sometime in early spring of 1974.  Public hearings were underway, the depositions and fact gathering had been done, and witnesses were testifying (against those depositions, to keep them honest) in public hearings.  Support for impeachment rose sharply in July after the Supreme Court ruled Nixon had to release the White House tapes.  (I was working in a bookstore at the time; I remember the paperback copies piled on tables.  I had one myself for years, though like most people, I never read it.)  Nixon resigned in August.

Trump is fighting a losing battle against law and order.  He has been a civics lesson in who we DON'T want to have as a national leader, and he may have woken us all to who represents us, and how well they do that.  We won't sweep out the Devin Nunez' and the Louie Gohmerts, but we may marginalize them completely.  We may soon have, briefly, three parties:  the Democrats, what's left of the GOP, and the new party that takes up a more conservative bent than AOC and Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, but is more ready to make common cause for the sake of the nation, rather than throw bombs and defy subpoenas, for the sake of power itself.

I really don't think the latter form of governance is all that appealing to the majority of the electorate. It usually takes something extraordinary to stir them into awareness; but Trump seems to be that something.


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