History, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Popular Culture, War Commentary

Want To Restore Article II?

32 Comments

Elect Donald Trump:

We are in the last few weeks of a presidential campaign that presents the most horrible choice on offer in our lifetimes, and perhaps in American history. The worst things that each major-party candidate say about each other are largely true. The next President to take the oath to defend and preserve the Constitution will very likely either be someone who despises it (particularly the first two amendments of the Bill of Rights), or someone who has almost certainly never even read it. Both of them have high public levels of disapproval, and a large swathe of the nation will loathe the next president, regardless of who wins. That is where we are. But there may yet be a glimmer of hope.

My thoughts, over @ricochet.

[Friday-morning update]

Related thoughts from Ace:

So both are bad actors. The question which remains is: Which bad actor will be more restrained by the political establishment of Washington DC?

You can’t judge a predator’s ability to ravish an environment without looking at the environment in which that predator operates.

Trump, if these allegations are true (and even if they’re not — he’s still shady and megalomaniacal) is a jackal being released into a swamp full of alligators looking to devour him.

Do I fear the jackal abroad in the swamp full of alligators? Well — no. No I don’t.

I almost pity him.

This jackal, being megalomaniacal, may think he can bully and beat up the alligators.

The rest of us know better, and know this particular jackal will be a warm, full feeling in someone’s belly by the dawn of the third day.

Clinton, meanwhile, is a jackal being set loose in a field full of sheep with no defenses (any Republican or Christian unprotected by the elite power structure) and a pack of ravening jackal minions who will gladly join her in hunting and tearing apart the sheep.

Yes.

[Late-morning update]

Trump the transgressive candidate. I do think he is unique to the moment.

[Saturday-morning update]

Let me make the point a different way. Mitt Romney liked to be able to fire people. The American people should like that, too. Trump is the only one of the two to whom we’ll be able to say “You’re fired!”

[Sunday-afternoon update]

I hadn’t noticed this at the time, but David Galernter was thinking along the same lines about the same time (though I actually pointed it out months ago):

Mrs. Clinton is right at home in the Oval Office and thinks she owns it. She holds herself entitled to supreme power, as her friends are entitled to fancy positions with enormous salaries and her followers to secure government jobs or ample government funds, as the case may be.

But forget psychology. Ordinary politics says that Mr. Trump will not do crazy things or go off half-cocked, because Republicans in Congress will be eager to impeach him and put Mike Pence in charge. That was the subtext of the vice-presidential debate, though Mr. Pence himself (probably) didn’t intend it. When it’s my turn, you can all relax. Democrats, obviously, will be eager to help when the task is removing a Republican.

Impeachment is Trump-voters’ ace in the hole. It’s an abnormal measure, but this is an abnormal year. Impeachment has temporarily dropped out of sight because of special circumstances. Republicans impeached Bill Clinton but got burned in the process; Mr. Obama, as the first black president, was impeachment-proof. Any other president would have encountered serious impeachment talk on several occasions, especially when he ignored Congress and the Constitution and made his own personal treaty-in-all-but-name with Iran.

As I pointed out, she will be impeachment proof as well, because a) she’s a Democrat, b) she’s a Clinton and c) any attempt to do so will be decried as “sexism.”

32 thoughts on “Want To Restore Article II?”

  1. Trump’s peccadilloes aren’t about being president (we know the general history of our presidents.) Otherwise, talking impeachment at this point is delusional. He has to actually do something while in office.

    What’s he going to do? Who’s he beholding to? In Trump’s case, it’s just the people. He’s going to build the wall. He has to. As for everything else, some he will do and some he will not. That’s not justification for impeachment.

    Regardless you still get Pence. Without Hillary, the country may still have a future.

    1. Technically, as I read the Constitution, impeachment can happen before the subject takes the oath of office, for whatever excuse Congress finds sufficient. The penalty includes ineligibility to hold office. In practice, impeachment without a solid charge isn’t politically viable. Trump hasn’t done anything, even as a civilian, of magnitude to merit impeachment. Hillary, on the other hand, has committed multiple felonies on which she’s skated, and for which an honest Congress might impeach her.

      1. We know Hillary and Podesta have extensive business dealings with Russia. Podesta even lobbied for them in the USA. Russia is just one of the many bad actors that Hillary is taking bribes from.

        Plenty of evidence in the leaked emails to show that quid pro quo is taking place.

      2. You misunderstand debt in Trump’s world. It is not leverage on him. It’s his leverage on those he owes.

    3. He’s going to build the wall. He has to.

      Of course he isn’t going to build the wall, and of course he doesn’t have to. Believing Trump’s wall promise is like enrolling in Trump University because Trump promised you’d get rich. Trump isn’t about the wall, and Trump isn’t about you. Trump is about Trump.

  2. The argument I’ve made to liberals is that Trump is just a man, Hillary is an entire crime syndicate full of people whose primarily loyalty is to Hillary, not the country or even the Democrat party.

    The media won’t be covering up for Trump. His staffers won’t even be covering up for him. With Hillary, everything is already a cover up, from the press to the DNC. Her corruption, both personal and of any institution that deals with her, is already baked in. She has a pathological need for unethical behavior and abuse of power, and the result will damage liberalism for generations, just as Republicans still suffer some after effects from Nixon.

    1. and the result will damage liberalism for generations

      Nope, they get off on this. How many times have you heard we need a dictator or monarchy from the left recently? I’ve heard it more than a few times.

      Unless you mean classical liberalism, then yes, we’re f’d. That is unless you have kept up on your party dues and have the right skin color for good placement on the racial hierarchy.

      1. Eventually being in any ‘right class of people’ will be meaningless because equality will be achieved for the powerless. Total wealth goes down, while concentrated wealth stays with those in power (the top still has to reward the middle.)

    2. The argument I’ve made to liberals is that Trump is just a man, Hillary is an entire crime syndicate full of people whose primarily loyalty is to Hillary, not the country or even the Democrat party.

      Exactly right George. This has to be drilled into everybody’s brain. Given this as truth, Trump could be evil in a dozen ways and still be the only positive choice.

      I still think, even though the attacks have hurt him, the polls are lying and Trump is ahead. People are on to Hillary.

      The loyalty to Hillary is not even that they like her. They fear her. There are people that know her and are right to fear her. Whatever Bill said to Lynch scared her. Putin is known to kill his opponents in a way that is deniable but at the same time sends the message, “hell yeah, I did it.” I think it’s exactly the same with the Clintons combined with a carrot. Play ball and you get rewarded… I think both Sanders and Comey demonstrate that. Both know their reputations were trashed, but went along anyway.

      Trump needs to get those Sanders supporters if he hasn’t already. The woman that this smear campaign is targeted at aren’t voting Hillary.

        1. Creepy Joe Biden and Release my chakras Al Gore

          Also, Hillary is the mob.

          Your example and my examples illustrate Rand’s point perfectly. Two terrible choices but one operates outside of the law and social constraints because the judicial wing, legislative wing, and the aspiring to be fourth wing of government want her to operate outside the law and social constraints.

        2. Years ago, every business in NYC had to deal with the mob. IDK what the situation is today, but from how Vegas has changed in the last 40 years I could probably make a pretty accurate guess.

    1. The test will be how fast he is adopted back into the socialite party circuit and entertainment industry from whence he came.

  4. But the path away from Trumpism requires defeating, not just one of the three legs of Trump’s transgressivism, but all three.

    Professional transgression: People are tired of professional politicians who have no accomplishments other than being a politician and then do a bad job as politicians. Bringing in fresh meat from people who actually engage in the capitalist system in a fundamental way is important.

    Ideological transgression: Being against illegal immigration is now a transgression? When did the GOPe decide this and were they going to tell anyone? Did anyone tell GW Bush that campaigning on a restrained foreign policy of no nation building that he was ideologically transgressing? And NATO has a lot of problems from Turkey to some of our EU partners not shouldering their share of the burden.

    Social transgression: We need some transgression against cultural marxism. Believing in capitalism and individuality is now a transgressive act. I don’t agree with the alt right, and even think much of it is fake, but these people deserve freedom of speech too. We are trending toward fascism and soon only people who speak in support of the ever shifting Democrat party line will be allowed to speak.

    The GOP needs to reach some sort of modus vivendi with these voters, but they are clearly a minority faction of the party and should be treated like any other sizeable but minority faction.

    Stabbed in the back?

    Trump is a flash in the pan. He doesn’t have a nationwide network like the Libertarian or Green parties. He didn’t rise to prominence because of one. Both Trump and Sanders rose to prominence because voters of both parties feel they have been stabbed in the back by the ruling class.

    The way to deal with Trumpism is to adopt a credible response and accommodation to the three transgressions. The GOPe and NR crowd will not be happy with the future if they continue lying to their constituents.

  5. This is a ridiculous argument. Leftism is a one-way ratchet. You can impeach as many REPUBLICANS as you like. The democrat will never impeach one of their own. All you’re doing is shooting your side in the foot by suggesting they play by gentleman’s rules while the other side is cheating. This is the reason Trump is the nominee and people you supported are not. You’ve had your chance for 20 years to make something of the GOP side of things. You and yours failed. Now sit down and shut up while the rest of us give it a try.

      1. He can speak for himself, but what you might be missing is Trump may be exactly what this country needs to fix the problems that have relentlessly increased regardless of what good guy gets elected.

        Trump hits the target. I don’t care how badly he throws the darts.

  6. I don’t really think Trump is all that bad, but I can understand the POV of people who think otherwise and, from that POV, this is a good column. Sending it out to my peeps.

  7. Of course Trump is transgressive, but the article gets everything else wrong. So much so, that I’ll have to make a post about it on my blog to attempt to cover it all.

  8. Which bad actor will be more restrained by the political establishment of Washington DC?

    My reason for voting for Trump in the general (I figured he would get this far, but I’ve never supported him or voted for him in the primary) since before the first primary vote. I’m not as worried about Trump as some, but those who are see Trump as the poster child for limited Presidential power. I’ll vote for that poster child over the other person I believe is a Che Guevara or Josef Stalin type poster child.

      1. Not sure I agree with your reading material. I also no longer trust cracked. Still, that Economic Innovation Group graphic in item 3 is pretty amazing and depressing.

        There’s also a lot there that fits with Rand’s recent argument about state electors voting vs populous voting.

        1. “Not sure I agree with your reading material.”

          I found both links at Small Dead Animals, which I highly recommend.

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