Trump, Cont

 I brought up my personal rules of thumb in the prior post, because when it comes to Trump people are all over the map.

I have heard people argue that he and his administration are all incompetent buffoons, and no threat. That they're sinister manipulators, deliberately exhausting us with scandal after scandal. That Trump wants to start his own news network. That he's afraid of losing his immunity from prosecution, and thus will do anything to stay in office. That he's trying to take on the 'deep state' and a cabal of satanic pedophiles who drink the blood of innocent children. That he's a fraud, and that you really have to watch out for the manipulative masterminds using him (said manipulator could be Putin, or Stephen Miller, or Mitch McConnell, or someone else).

All of these, btw, have very different meanings for our current situation. Is the buffoonery in court something we can safely ignore? Is all this fuss and furor simply the Republican Party humoring Trump because they're too afraid to tell him he lost? Or do they seriously think they can overturn this election, and how far are they willing to go to do it? How much are they riling up the base because they're fools who put a short term win over the long term good of this country, and how much is the tail wagging the dog? 

Truthfully, I look forward to Biden taking office because it's been like this for four. fricking. years. All rumor and speculation and nobody really ever seems to know. It's exhausting, whether that's deliberate and drawing from Putin's playbook or not, and I'm really rather sick of it. There has been so much crap that eventually gets pushed aside and forgotten because of whatever the next big scandal is, and it just keeps on happening over and over and over again. I'm tired of it. I want it to go away. I want Trump to fade into obscurity and I never want to hear about him ever again. (That's not happening, I know. I just wish it would.)

There's always been a hefty amount of speculation about what goes on in a president's court, but the speculation surrounding Trump and his team is on a whole other level. 

Which makes it very, very hard to evaluate much of anything. (I suppose I probably ought to read some of Woodward's books about the Trump administration. I generally haven't bought books like that before, but I do like articles that have that sort of insider view. Mostly because they contain pieces to add to my puzzle, if that makes sense. Like... I care less about the political stance - though that does matter - and more about what sort of decision-making team they're building. Are they surrounding themselves with yes-men and loyalists? How do they handle bad news? Do they micro-manage? Are they surrounding themselves with people like Rumsfeld and Cheney? Do they have a kitchen cabinet? I can't really describe what I'm looking for, specifically, just that every so often I stumble across something that feels like an important piece worth noting.)

Much of the problem is that Trump, more than any president in my lifetime, evokes the hope and fear that generally clouds people's judgment. 

I started off with the 'hope' because even though I've grown convinced he won't fulfill those expectations, many of his supporters hope he will. They want him to stop the forever wars, stop us from losing jobs overseas, stop enabling a system that ignores and marginalizes average Americans... there's a lot of stuff he tapped into in order to get the support he has. (It's just that most of them are so blinded by that hope that they ignore and dismiss the many, many signs that Trump isn't their guy.)

The flip side of that is fear. You all are probably familiar with that, too. Fear that Trump is another Hitler in the making. That he is far more clever than people give him credit for, and is using that cleverness maliciously. That he will launch a coup, if he hasn't already, and destroy the democracy we hold so dear.

Getting at the truth is hard, if not downright impossible. For as much turnover as he's had with his staff and as much as they do leak to the press, all it seems to do is generate more and more conflicting reports... so it tends to add to the confusion and uncertainty rather than really help.

I'll also admit that I've disliked Trump since well before he ever ran for office. I've never watched The Apprentice, and I never wanted to. He gave the impression, to me at least, of the typical mistaken image of a 'great leader' that I would actually never want to work for. He reminds me of the Jim Collins books How the Mighty Fall and the description of the 'white knight CEO' type that companies hire as they tip into failure. All that "I alone can save you" BS, when what we really need is the type of leader who says "together we can ____"

But... I never watched his show, so it's not like I have much to make that evaluation with. I have read various things over the years, though. Like the contractors he hired and then stiff to work on his hotels. And how he tended to use his money and power to bully them with litigation (since most of these hard working contractors can't afford a sustained legal effort).

While I don't have any direct access, the picture I've built over the years is of someone who is angry, petty, and vindictive. Unpredictable, too. Rather a bully, with no concern about 'norms' or 'conventions' or any sort of morals I've been able to find. Very transactional. He lives in that 'I got mine, how you do' world I've described before... and if he does you a favor he expects payback. Like the way he threatens federal aid to state governors he doesn't like. 

We've had people for years talk about when he'll start acting presidential, when he'll be more 'normal'... and although  he manages to tone things down for a day or a week or so, it never lasts. This is what we have, this is who he is, and every time you expect him to act like a 'normal' president you will be wrong.

I have no idea what he's thinking. More importantly, I think his only limit comes from the people around him. And given we've seen the Republican Party roll over for him, repeatedly, I have no idea what that means. Oh, and I do think there's some fishy stuff going on with the Christian conservatives - the DeVoss, and Erik Prince, and Bill Barr types. Sydney Powell is apparently one of them, too. Heck if I know what they're up to, other than that I don't think it's anything good. 

At least the military is one of those limits (and thank God for our history of being apolitical, and swearing to the Constitution rather than an individual. Realpolitik focuses on the underlying ability to use force to support your position. It's... misleading I think. For reasons I'm not ready to write about right now. But there's an element of truth to it in that the ability to control the military and use force to win is often a deciding factor. That's why military coups happen so often in history... and also why our norms and traditions of the citizen soldier matter. It's also interesting how our presidency, for all the power and resources available for foreign policy and international relations, actually has quite strict limits domestically. That is by design, of course. But we talk about 'most powerful man' and 'leader of the free world', and yet state governors can and have essentially told him to f___ off. Generally more politely than that, ofc.)

All of which is a long and complicated way of saying - I don't know what the heck is going on, but it concerns me. Especially since it's now been a couple of weeks since the election and there is still no sign that Trump and his supporters have accepted his loss. 

And I won't rest easy until Biden is inaugurated in January.