The Trump Years

I am a student of history. I tend to ignore the world I live in favoring to view instead the world we will all one day look back on.  How will history remember Trump?

I think 20 years from now Trump will be as distant (possibly even way more distant) than Bill Clinton is to people now; kids today probably only know Clinton as Hillary's husband, though I don't think that view will last long into the future. I think 20 years from now Trump will still be hated--I suspect "Trump" will be a buzzword for universal disgust for the rest of my lifetime. But will we recall everything that he did and/or everything that happened during his term in the Oval Office? I doubt it, because the hatred for Trump never needed a reason to begin with, so why would we bother to catalog his efforts? 

The historian's eye view will look back on Trump's presidency, I think, with as much of an emphasis on the anti-Trump rhetoric as to Trump himself. Trump courted the anti-Trump media, one of the rare Republicans that actually enjoys being the villain and feels like getting tarred in the media all day is a sign of his success. To be sure, Trump will likely never develop any real defenders in the future but the further we get away from this time, the harder it will be to distinguish, say, the George Floyd protests from the January 6th siege on the Capitol.  It will all look like one continuous four year struggle of social unrest with blame going all around. (*) Beginning with the FBI wiretapping the presumptive national security adviser or the calls for Trump's impeachment before he was even inaugurated! Moving through the all day every day anti-Trump media rhetoric, the first impeachment (which failed to remove him from office and actually resulted in more votes for Trump in 2020 than he received in 2016) and culminating in Trump's embarrassingly clumsy and self-serving handling of his failure to win reelection.  Future historians will just lump it all together as the collective media-driven angst of the American populace finally driven over the edge by Covid-19. 

Will we look back on January 6th with shame and revulsion? I suspect not. Outside of tying it to Trump's legacy--which, again, needs no actual events to be recalled--I doubt the siege on the Capitol will be remembered any better than any of the other previous sieges on the Capitol (**). Watching the gravity-inflected voices of the chattering media trying to make this seem like the next 9/11 is mystifying to me because it's the exact opposite: we just watched Lebron James dribble the ball off his foot and we're acting like he just hit the game winner at the buzzer. The "siege" accomplished nothing, because there was nothing accomplish. 

And rather than being one of those indelible cultural moments that everyone will forever remember (9/11 for contemporary adults, the Challenger for my generation, JFK for my parents, Pearl Harbor for grandparents), I think this will fade because the sheer range of what people saw (and will see) is too diffuse to actually make sense of. There's video of cops letting people into the Capitol, video of cops fighting to hold people out, video of cops taking selfies with rioters, video of cops shooting and killing a rioter. Even in the future they will not know how to draw that fine line between carnival and circus. Even in the future they'll see real violence but they'll also know that these people were not mowed down by a hail of bullets, nor were they really any threat to anyone but themselves (and the cops). 

The reason those rioters weren't mowed down by a hail of bullets (on live television, no less) was because that would've been a far more traumatic experience for the country than what actually happened. And what actually happened? According to Chuck Shumer, upon returning to the Senate floor to perform the business of January 6: "As we reconvene tonight, let us remember in the end all this mob has really accomplished is to delay our work by a few hours.  We will resume our responsibilities now and we will finish our task tonight. The House and Senate chambers will be restored good as new and ready for legislating in short order." Rarely has Senator Shumer taken the words right out of my mouth, but that is precisely what I was thinking as I watched the Senate reconvene that night. 

This is one of the many weird little moments of American history that people forget about because in the world of politics there is always something new to take up our attention and only future historians actually look back to figure out what took place. It will be noted in the public record that windows were smashed, a police officer was killed (***), as was one of the rioters, and the House and Senate took a few hours longer than usual to perform its daily business. 

If this is the worst the pro-Trump hate-driven redneck right wing nationalists has to offer, then we have nothing to fear. Likewise, if Black Lives Matter can produce nothing more than a few dozen rowdier than normal public gatherings every summer, then the Republic will not soon die. The Media speeds up the wider recognition of these spasms of action so they hit with greater intensity but they burn out quickly because no one is in enough agreement to actually affect any actual change. The Media holds the key to the dreaded 'mass mobilization' because it can reach so many people so quickly; but it draws so many people in so many different directions that there is no coherent center and violence peters out quickly. (How many more generations until the People learn to tune out even the Media itself?)

We fear the tinderbox event that will ignite a wider conflagration but what we see instead is a constant simmering of vague antagonism that will likely never subside but I think won't combust (any time soon). We were born of crisis and we have lived in crisis every day since. Our politics is the non-stop need for crisis and the wider our society grows, the wider and wider the crises--real and imagined--will grow, as well. We drive each other to panic, it's just what we do. But we don't go to extremes because we are such a diverse nation with so many voices in so many stages of life, so many socioeconomic levels, so many different stages of educational and professional attainment, that we are pulled to and fro but never in any particular direction. So many voices louder than ever--and what do you know?--they don't agree on anything. That's not Politics, that's just how Life works.

I think what Trump wanted on January 6th was for his band of drunken redneck slobs to go down to the Capitol and stand around outside looking all menacing. If violence erupted with cops, then fine, he can say, 'my people get beat up by the cops, too!' I don't think he expected cops to open the barriers and just let people in (a brilliant gambit, still not sure who to credit for that: let the rowdies inside, let them show the world how much they truly respect the United States Congress). And the rowdies had no plan because they've never understood how anything works and they didn't know what they were supposed to do anyway (****), so they mostly bumbled around like ugly Americans and then when a single shot was fired, they scattered like roaches with the light on. 

I can see calling these rioters "Insurrectionists" because I can believe that some of these people actually believed that that's what they were doing; but that doesn't make what they did an "Insurrection". What would have been "insurrectioned" that day if the rioters had succeeded? Is there any scenario where any actions taken by those rioters would've resulted in a transfer of gov't power? No. So while we can be horrified and reviled by the shameless display of stupidity, thinking of it an as attempted overthrow of the gov't is pretty ignorant to what gov't overthrows have typically looked liked throughout history. Any gov't that would've fallen to the January 6 rioters is no gov't at all. Is this an insurrection?

The point was to protest the electoral college (suddenly making the Left the defenders of a system they've never liked) and put pressure on Mike Pence in hopes of crushing his political hopes and dreams. But the actual procedural reality of these moves is nil. None of these things are how elections work.  

Look, here's how the two-party system operates: at the end of the day the secret handshake committee has decided that Democrats and Republicans will not fuck with elections. The peaceful transfer of power is held up as the highest ideal and both parties have pledged to this. If they think they can steal an election, they will, but deep down the parties understand that all they have is the force of their corruption and that there are limits to that. So they have agreed to let election results go pretty much uncontested. The election of 1960, for example, may have been a steal, but it was stolen fair and square (*****). What about Bush v Gore, I hear you say. Well, that was an election that was so fucking close they actually had to bust out procedure. The election of 2000 is not an example of a 'steal' but of a deadlock that actually had to be adjudicated in dusty and forgotten methods. 

Trump's complaints about the 2020 election results, though clearly self-aggrandizing, were not really out of bounds legally speaking. It isn't for Yahoo News to determine whether Trump's claims were "baseless", it is for the courts to decide and if Trump--or any other contestant--wants to challenge the vote in any of the 50 states, that is legal and permissible and might even be successful (although I doubt it, because that's not what the parties want). If the Republican Party really wanted to keep Trump, I think some of his legal challenges would've succeeded--there would've been managers, commissioners, aldermen, supervisors, county blah blahs found to corroborate his claims. That shit didn't happen because the Republicans were cognizant that the election results were not going to be overturned and that Trump's efforts were abhorrent to the secret handshake about the peaceful transition of power. 

But Trump never gave a shit about two-party politics--that's the whole reason he won in 2016. Trump was out for Trump and the party apparatus wasn't coaxed by his bullying. I believe this is why Trump didn't campaign as hard as he could have in the senate run off elections (fuck the Republicans, they didn't do anything for me! What do I care if they lose the Senate?), making for a weird end to his term: his popularity swamped the Republican Party and when he chose to forsake them, he left them completely out of power in his wake. 

As for contesting the election, that is Trump speaking to his base. You read "base" and think politics, but I would suggest no. Trump never wanted to be president, never cared about the presidency, never cared about this two-party bullshit. He is always out for his own brand, which demands non-stop growth of popularity. Contesting the election is just something he had to do to convince his people that he was trying. But he's ready to be a public citizen again, he's ready to be out of the shackles of the White House. Or...at least he was...until January 6th. His followers were so ineffective and stupid they got Trump impeached again, banned from Twitter (the REAL punishment) and may well have tied Trump forever to the booger eaters and conspiracy theory whackos (and I mean the ones that even the conspiracy whackos think are whackos!) and finished him for good. The post-Presidency plan was to go back to being a self-important media shill. But January 6th showed his enemies he has no real power, played out his supporters as a bunch of out of touch weirdos and may well have gotten him banned from running again (******). January 6th finished off the political career of Donald Trump and it was his own fuckin' fault. He played with fire and eventually it burned up everything he had. 

I'm all for the second impeachment. Unlike the first one, which I found frivolous, pointless and shamelessly political, this one strikes me as exactly what the impeachment was designed for. And though I think the wording of the Impeachment is a bit clumsy, I understand the desire to act quickly while the public mood is so decisive. And of course this is not a legal trial but a purely political vote, so while I'd personally rather see some real legal language in this piece of posterity, I also acknowledge that that isn't required and as time is of the essence, I'm willing to let it go. 

And it deliciously places the dagger in Mitch McConnell's hand. I never thought McConnell liked Trump and I bet he's no more eager to have Trump blathering on about 2024 than anyone else is. McConnell is the ultimate representative of the two-party handshake system I described above. And Trump was always a threat to that order and to McConnell's beloved Republican Party. Now McConnell has the chance to string up Trump's carcass, gut the fucking pig, bleed him out on the floor of the Senate and say, 'I never liked that piece of shit, he was never one of us and if you're offended by what I just did, then go vote Democrat.' (*******)

I suspect McConnell's request for a two-week recess is so that the Republicans can clear out the Trump wackos and bringing back some semblance of order to the GOP. If so, then gutting Trump like a strung-up hog is absolutely the way to go. The Republicans can shed themselves of the dead weight in a clear and decisive manner and I suspect there are plenty of Republicans that are more than happy to rid themselves once and for all of Trump (off the top of my head I can think of one named Melania). 

The harder the Democrats work to make the January 6th siege look like 9/11, the more they give Trump and his booger-eating followers a lever to come back in 2024--we're powerful, they're afraid of us!. But if they don't play this up for all its worth, then the Twitter Left will feel 'disrespected'--remember the Liberal Media that hated Trump never particularly liked Biden. But if the Democrats stand aside and let the Republicans do it, it could provide some of that 'unity' that politicians love talking about so much. Removing Trump's ability to run again vastly decreases his blathering power in the coming years. And while getting Trump out of office was never that meaningful, running him out of Twitter might be the real death knell. He's melting like the Wicked Witch he always was. 

When Twitter/Facebook/etc banned Trump basically what they were saying was they thought they could survive just fine without the traffic that Trump was driving. And while the Liberal Left spent every day for the last four years sipping the Trump cocktail, Twitter is confident that Twitter has taken over enough that people will just keep Twittering even after Trump is gone. I suspect Twitter is correct. 

Now is the time for Trump to prove how popular he actually is by forming his own media empire...except that this Capitol siege basically just showed that his following ain't enough. And what political cronies he may have taken with him are surely abandoning him as fast they can. What will be remembered in political circles is the way he baited potentially violent throngs of people into going after Mike Pence. That is an impeachable offense! Even a criminal offense! That is something that will finish off Trump for good in Washington. (And I wouldn't be surprised if it turns Pence into a more beloved figure in Republican insider circles)

Liberal media can keep Republicans from getting too popular but can't create a Democrat consensus at the same time. Realistically this is called 'checks and balances', though ordinary citizens just think of it as nobody getting what they want. I've long believed that Politics is the province of charlatans and fools; now after the Trump years, I can add booger eaters and unsatisfiables to this list as well. Umbrage taking is deep in our lineage and it is annoying and gross and I can't believe we still do it. Americans talk a lot of shit considering how much pearl-clutching they do.  

It isn't Trump that made me numb, it was the anti-Trump. Listen, I never cared about Trump, I never liked Trump, I never supported Trump, I never voted for Trump, I never sought out Trump. And I don't spend much time at distinctly right-wing media centers, so it wasn't pro-Trump blather I heard all day. It was the anti-Trump monolith that drove me so far away from the Left. The Left hated on Trump all day every day without ever bothering to differentiate the important stuff (reckless and stupid trade war with China) from insignificant nonsense (Stormy Daniels). There were many many many good reasons to hate Trump and I don't think the Left ever bothered to come up with one because they have no need for objective reality. They hated Trump not for anything he actually did but for merely being elected. 

The Good/Bad news is this: this is how it is supposed to work. We've somehow come around to believing that "Democracy" means we're all supposed to agree with each other, when in fact the opposite is the case: we are free to disagree with each other without everything falling to shit. I can hear the reply: "But it has fallen to shit!" To which I'll say, "Meh." When Rome had a bad day, there'd be 500 dead bodies in the drinking water that night; we haven't had anywhere near that many casualties after an entire year of virtually non-stop unrest across America, not even from a storming of the Capitol building itself! The Media makes it seems as if the world is ending because the Media needs to be re-created every single day. (The screen is not the reality, it is just a screen) 

We just had an election where more people voted--in more ways!--than ever before and despite a sitting president openly questioning the results, we managed to have two more run-off elections and swore in a new Congress and a new President. And yet we're told that Democracy is dying and our system is broken. What, exactly, is "broken"? And if you think all the turmoil was just because of Trump, wait til you see a Congress full of Democrats--300 liberals in a room together will never agree on anything. 

You know what our elections gave us? A House and Senate so close that they will have to make compromises to get shit done. And a President and a Senate Minority Leader that have known each other their whole lives--indeed, I can't think of a President and a Senate Minority Leader that were so close (LBJ and Everett Dirkson, I suppose). I think Biden and McConnell, if allowed by the liberal media, can actually get a lot of shit done. And in the House I think the far Left wing will get pushed aside, especially if they attack Pelosi (hey, man, they were built to question authority and now that Trump is gone, who you think they're gonna be questioning?), meaning reaching across the aisle in Congress might actually become a thing again. 

We've been told over and over that America's is politically divided and gone to the extremes; quite the opposite, ladies and gentlemen. The election of 2020 stunted the woke socialist agenda and discarded Trump simultaneously. The extremes were neutered and we've been pushed back to the center. But the Media relies on crisis, Politics relies on crisis, so when good things happen, no one is allowed to notice.

Trump exploited innate crisis all the way to the White House and then all the way back out again. Trump is the effect, not the cause. The longer it takes us to realize that, the more time and money we will waste. In short...nothing has changed, nothing is different, our society is as vibrant as ever. And Democracy has never been stronger. Is that good news or bad news? You decide.

I will now repeat my mantra: the gov't was here when you born, it will be here when you die, it doesn't care about you and it couldn't even if it wanted to. Devote your time and your energy to the causes you believe in instead of politics. And stop believing in gov't, it just makes you prone to overreactions.  

(*) Culminating, of course, with Coronavirus--the real culprit for the last 12 months of unrest. Will Trump be blamed for it? In Liberal media, absolutely he will. But historically speaking, do we blame Woodrow Wilson for the Spanish Flu? No, nor should we. Pandemics happen all the time, they are impacted little by the powers that be. 

(**) This is my new favorite piece of historical trivia that I'd never heard before. Granted, this is during the Articles of Confederation period that even the most ardent students of American history never pay any attention to. But it does show why Washington DC was created--and why turning it into a state is not necessarily in Congress's best interest.  

(***) Say his name: Brian Sicknick. This man is a true patriot who died for his country. Will the name Brian Sicknick forever be enshrined and whispered in hallowed halls every January 6th? I doubt it, but I suppose it's possible. 

(****) This is the case against Trump "inciting" the rioters. Have you ever read a transcript of Trump's ramblings? I think you'll notice very quickly that he does not speak in complete sentences, he does not communicate complete thoughts. He is a cypher, an empty vessel onto which you can project your own anxieties. The Liberal Media spent four solid years projecting on to Trump whatever it wanted and, to my mind, what we refer to as "Trumpists" were reacting to the anti-Trump rhetoric, which is much more cohesive and easier to understand than Trump himself. The Trumpists never cared about Trump save that he solidified a left-wing opposition to which the Trumpists could themselves take opposition. Trump was never worth paying attention to, I never understood why anyone would even bother to like or dislike him. Trump is a meaningless shit-talking weirdo, I've been telling you that for years. How can anyone listen to him for very long and think that he is still worth listening to? 

(*****) We don't remember 1948 or 1968 or 2004 that way but I'm not sure why not, they were all close enough to summon chicanery.

(******) Whether or not Trump actually wants to run again in 2024, pretending like he does surely would've been the core of his rhetoric for the next coupla years. He has to look like he wants the White House back even if he doesn't (and really, why would he?).  

(*******) Not as unrealistic as you might think. The far-off fringes of the populace don't know the difference between Right and Left, between Democrat and Republican and if they think that Black Lives Matter means we're allowed to blow up shopping malls and shit, well, I wouldn't be shocked to see even the white supremacists finding common cause with anti-white supremacists (which is just a testament to what pointless fucking drivel the concept of race is to begin with).