We Know Trump Didn't Write A Word Of The Art Of The Deal, But Did He Ever Read It?

Congressional caucuses often invite special guest speakers Last week Ted Lieu organized for the House Democrats on the uses of social media, featuring Alexandria Ocasio and a rep from Twitter. It went over so well-- and standing room only-- that they're following up with sessions devoted to effective use of Facebook, Instagram, etc. Smart. At the same time Ted and AOC were helping some of their colleagues take steps into a new and mysterious world for many of them, McConnell invited Karl Rove to come over and speak to the Senate Republicans-- specifically the 22 up for reelection next year-- about sn alternative the failed Trump "it's-all-about-the-base" strategy that cost the House GOP 42 red districts in which independent voters deserted Republican incumbents and candidates in droves.

Alexander Bolton reported for The Hill that "GOP lawmakers are getting nervous about next year’s election as polls show President Trump’s approval rating dropping during the 28-day government shutdown, with economic experts warning that the standoff could dampen economic growth significantly. Rove advised lawmakers at the meeting not to rely too much on the conservative base, which is solidly behind Trump in the stalemate over funding for a border wall, and to remember the importance of expanding the GOP’s appeal, according to Republicans familiar with his remarks."

An NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll published Thursday showed the president has seen his approval rating drop by 9 points and his disapproval rating climb by 9 points among suburban men.  A GOP source familiar with Thursday’s meeting said Rove talked about his column published in the Wall Street Journal the previous day that warned “a base-only strategy is a perilous bet for 2020” and advised “the party that realizes this first may gain the edge in the coming presidential contest.”

Rove in his op-ed argued that while Democrats have refused to compromise, the White House should consider “publicly announcing an offer to end the shutdown” by asking for border wall funding in return for legal status for Dreamers.

A Quinnipiac University poll published Monday showed that registered independent voters found the arguments of Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Senate Democratic Leader Charles Schumer (NY) more believable than Trump’s by a margin of 48 percent to 33 percent.

Rove also discussed the problems that GOP candidates had appealing to suburban voters in the 2018 midterm, according to a Republican senator who heard his remarks.

...Senate Republican Whip John Thune (SD) acknowledged to reporters earlier in the week that the president still needs to convince independent voters that funding the border wall is worth a partial government shutdown.

“The real battlefield is for those independent voters and I don’t think he’s probably won them over yet,” he said.

Democratic pollsters are confident their party is winning the public relations battle over the shutdown, which they say is hurting Republicans especially among suburban and independent voters.

“Normally people respond [a government shutdown] is a pox on both your houses but people really think the shutdown is due to Trump,” said Celinda Lake, a Democratic pollster.

“Shutdowns often get blamed on the Republicans because people think that Democrats like to do things with government so they are unlikely to shut it down,” she added.

Lake said that voters also view Trump as temperamental, which adds to the “situation where Republicans are going to carry a lot more of the blame.”

“Right now we are winning the swing [vote] on the shutdown,” she said.

A Pew Research Center poll published Wednesday found that 58 percent of Americans oppose substantially expanding the border wall while 40 percent favor it. Yet the survey also showed that 91 percent of conservative Republicans and GOP “leaners” favor expanding the wall. 

Jonathan Allen reported on Saturday for NBC News that "Trump broke a fundamental rule of modern politics Saturday when he outlined a new plan to get his border wall and re-open the federal government: Never split your own party. The basic idea is to give 1 million immigrants-- 700,000 so-called Dreamers who were brought to the country illegally as children and 300,000 refugees facing expiration of their 'temporary protected status'-- a three-year shield from deportation in exchange for $5.7 billion in funding for the wall. While Republican leaders on Capitol Hill praised his leadership, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) readily agreed to bring his proposal up for a vote on the floor next week, conservatives were quick to criticize the president for offering 'amnesty' to undocumented immigrants."

"Conservatives were quick to criticize...?" Like Mitch McConnell isn't a conservative? Has Jonathan Allen lost his marbles? He was referring to neo-Nazi extremist Ann Coulter as a "conservative." So McConnell is what? A liberal? A moderate? I don't think so. Why are mainstream corporate media schlepps like Allen so scared to call fascists and racists fascist and racists?

"Amnesty encourages further illegal immigration, incentivizes the tragedy of human trafficking, and undermines our citizens' confidence in the rule of law," James Carafano of the conservative Heritage Foundation said in a statement released shortly after Trump delivered remarks on the plan from the White House. "Amnesty should not be part of any border security deal, especially given that many who today oppose a wall have publicly supported and even voted for physical barriers in the recent past."

The obvious problem for Trump is that he managed to divide his own ranks without much chance of breaking the wall of Democratic opposition to his border barrier. Congressional Democrats were quick to reject his plan.

"The president’s announcement today falls flat and includes the same wasteful, ineffective and unpopular $5.7 billion wall demand that shut down the government in the first place," Rep. Joaquín Castro, chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, said in a statement. "Further, the President’s offer is similar to previous proposals that included temporary DACA protections and that the President killed last Congress."

The big political question is whether Trump's latest gambit will give traction to his ongoing argument that Democrats have been intransigent and should now shoulder the blame for the longest government shutdown in history. Polls have consistently shown that most Americans blame him-- he once said he would be "proud" to allow a lapse in funding for federal agencies in order to force Democrats to capitulate on the wall money-- and that only about a third of them see Democrats as the culprits.

If he finds himself offering more to Democrats to re-open the government later on-- or backs down from the wall-- he will have caused himself more pain than necessary by issuing this plan. If his proposal ends up shifting public opinion enough to move Democratic votes, that may take time.

So, as a practical matter, the government is no closer to opening, and Trump is no closer to getting cash for the wall.

Often, deal-making requires a president to disappoint a segment of his own base to attract support from a portion of the other party. But in this case, Trump has created a split within his own party without finding a way to divide Democrats.

That's certainly a non-traditional approach to politics, but it may not be a winning one.

Trump is the weakest president in memorable history. He has no credibility. He's a terrible deal-maker. He's not bright and not interested. And he has the worst advisors a weak, dumb president could ever be expected to surround himself with. If he brings the GOP down with him, it will certainly be well-deserved. One of the Republican senators up for reelection in 2020: Mitch McConnell. Another is his #2, John Cornyn... in a Texas that is rapidly migrating from solid red to more purple.