Trump Regime Is On The Road To Ruin

Every poll shows the same thing-- Trump is unpopular. His allies and cronies are unpopular. His agenda is even more hated than he is. After trying to pass his pet TrumpCare anti-healthcare bill, Not counting NJ sleaze bag Chris Christie, Paul Ryan is now the most unpopular politician in America-- with a 61% disapproval. Only 11% of Americans approve of the job Congress is doing, the Congress Ryan leads. Most Americans know Trump is dishonest; just 39% haven't caught on yet. And 72% of Americans have an unfavorable opinion of Trump's ultimate booster, KGB agent-turned autocrat/kleptocrat Vladimir Putin.

Friday, The Economist suggested that gloating is the wrong response and that a weakened, wounded president is very dangerous, for America and for the rest of the world as well. "It is tempting to feel relief that the Trump presidency is a mess," they wrote. "For those who doubt much of his agenda and worry about his lack of respect for institutions, perhaps the best hope is that he accomplishes little. That logic is beguiling, but wrong. After years of gridlock, Washington has work to do. The forthcoming summit with Xi Jinping, China’s president, shows how America is still the indispensable nation. A weak president can be dangerous-- picture a trade war, a crisis in the Baltics or conflict on the Korean peninsula."

Trump is hardly the first tycoon to discover that business and politics work by different rules. If you fall out over a property deal, you can always find another sucker. In politics you cannot walk away so easily. Even if Mr Trump now despises the Republican factions that dared defy him over health care, Congress is the only place he can go to pass legislation.

The nature of political power is different, too. As owner and CEO of his business, Mr Trump had absolute control. The constitution sets out to block would-be autocrats... Far from taking Washington by storm, America’s CEO is out of his depth. The art of political compromise is new to him. He blurs his own interests and the interests of the nation. The scrutiny of office grates. He chafes under the limitations of being the most powerful man in the world. You have only to follow his incontinent stream of tweets to grasp Mr Trump’s paranoia and vanity: the press lies about him; the election result fraudulently omitted millions of votes for him; the intelligence services are disloyal; his predecessor tapped his phones. It’s neither pretty nor presidential.

That the main victim of these slurs has so far been the tweeter-in-chief himself is testament to the strength of American democracy. But institutions can erode, and the country is wretchedly divided. Unless Mr Trump changes course, the harm risks spreading. The next test will be the budget. If the Republican Party cannot pass a stop-gap measure, the government will start to shut down on April 29th. Recent jitters in the markets are a sign that investors are counting on Mr Trump and his party to pass legislation.

...The Americans who voted for Mr Trump either overlooked his bombast, or they saw in him a tycoon with the self-belief to transform Washington. Although this presidency is still young, that already seems an error of judgment. His policies, from health-care reform to immigration, have been poor—they do not even pass the narrow test that they benefit Trump voters. Most worrying for America and the world is how fast the businessman in the Oval Office is proving unfit for the job.

To make matters even worse for himself, Trump has started threatening Republicans in Congress, trying to make it clear that if they don't buckle under to his will (and incoherent whims) he will campaign against them in primary challenges. He has personally threatened Mark Meadows (R-NC), Jim Jordan (R-OH), Mark Sanford (R-SC) and Raul Labrador (R-ID) and this morning Señor Trumpanzee Senior Advisor Dan Scavino rattled the Regime's sabers towards Grand Rapids, where the Trumpists are ready to go to war against the very independent-minded and much-admired Justin Amash. Last time the Republican establishment did that, Amash kicked their collectivie asses-- and it does't look that he fears the highly-- and increasingly-- unpopular Trump one bit.

Just hours after Scavino's tweet there was talk among ethics attorneys about having him charged with violating the Hatch Act, which regulates campaigning by government officials. And it didn't take Amash any time at all to hit right back at the chaotic, stumbling and conflicted Regime--and in no uncertain terms. #Trumpstablishment isn't something Trump and Bannon and the rest of the comrades are going to want to see trending anytime soon. If Trump does follow through with his threats and recruits some clown to primary Amash, I'd bet on Amash. Trump has lost every single congressional primary battle he's gotten involved with so far-- and his crony in this month's GA-06 special election, Bruce LeVell, isn't even going to break 1% in the primary! SAD.