A Very Stable Genius?

Beltway crackpot and chip off the Dick-and-Lynn-Cheney block, Liz Cheney, was on Meet The Press yesterday to assure Trump that she's a better friend of his than her antagonist Rand Paul. "When you look at the situation that President Trump inherited," she told Chuck Todd, "when he came into office, when you look at what we had seen happen, for example, across Iraq and Syria, when President Obama withdrew precipitously based on a political timetable. We had the rise of the caliphate. We had the rise of ISIS. President Trump's decision making and leadership changed that. One of the most important things this president has done is dedicate the resources necessary to begin rebuilding our defense department, rebuilding our military. Under Barack Obama, you had eight years, where our military did not get the resources it needed, while our adversaries built, deployed, and in some cases now, have weapons systems that we cannot defend against. So there's no question but that the world is safer, that we're in a situation where American leadership has come back. And it's important that we continue, continue down that path... Ambassador Bolton has served his nation honorably in a number of positions. But this president, any president, has the right to have the people around him he decides. The only people who are elected, in the West Wing, are the president and the vice president. And everybody else is staff. They serve at the pleasure of the president, the same with all the cabinet officials. So I think that's very important to point out. Secondly, I would say, there is no question but that the world is a very dangerous place, that America faces a very grave and complicated global threat environment. I think it's more dangerous than at any time since the end of World War II. But the way in which we are responding to that, the way in which we're dealing with it, the extent to which, for example, President Trump has been willing to walk away from dangerous deals, when he came into office, the United States was a party to the Iran Nuclear Accord. The United States was a party to the INF treaty. Both of those agreements were agreements that made us less safe. The INF treaty only restricted the United States, because the Russians cheated, and it didn't restrict the Chinese. The JCPOA, as we now know, the Iranians have continued to cheat, will continue to cheat. And then of course, we saw this horrific attack yesterday on the Saudi oil facilities."

Liz and Rand should be locked in a room together for a year or two

When Todd asked her if we need any proof it was the Saudis, she ignored the question and just continued saber-rattling, calling it "a very significant escalation. And I would say we ought to do several things. First of all, I would say we should deny the visas for the Iranian delegates who are planning to come into the United States, come to New York next week for the UN General Assembly... Secondly, I think, as her first step as our new UN ambassador, Kelly Craft, who's a terrific new UN ambassador, ought to offer a resolution for snapback sanctions to say, listen, it's very clear the Iranians, because of a number of things we've seen recently, including the secret warehouse that the Israelis found and revealed, where it's clear that they have now begun and continued their enrichment activities, expanded their enrichment activities. They're operating in total violation of the Iranian Nuclear Deal. And we ought to have those sanctions snapped back. I think that, you know, when you have entities like the Iranians, like the Taliban, who continue to attack American interests, as the Iranians are doing, who continue to kill Americans, as we've seen in the case of both the IRGC, as well as the Taliban and their ally Al Qaida, it's very important for us to send the message: you have to choose. You can either do diplomacy, or you can attack America and attack our interests. But we know you're not serious about diplomacy, if you continue to have the kinds of attacks we've seen over the last few days." She kept going... a loud, ugly voice for the neo-cons still trying to stoke up a war with Iran.

Yesterday's Guardian featured someone far more sane and rational than Liz Cheney will ever be. In his OpEd, Trump is seriously, frighteningly unstable-- the world is in danger, Robert Reich wrote that neither the 25th Amendment nor Pelosi-style faux-impeachment is going to solve anything-- only a massive turnout in November 2020. Like many of us, he recognizes that Trump has flipped his wig. (So has Biden, but not as badly yet.) "In retrospect, he wrote, "what’s most disturbing about “Sharpiegate” isn’t Trump’s clumsy effort to doctor a National Weather Service map or even his brazen move to get the same agency to lie on his behalf. It’s how utterly petty his motive was. We’ve had presidents trying to cover up a sexual liaison with an intern and a botched burglary, but never have we had one who went to such lengths to cover up an inaccurate weather forecast. Alabama being hit by a hurricane? Friends, this is not rational behavior. Trump also cancelled a meeting with the Taliban at Camp David. The meeting was to have been secret. It was scheduled for the week of the anniversary of 9/11. He cancelled it by tweet. Does any of this strike you as even remotely rational? Before that, Trump cancelled a state visit to Denmark because Denmark wouldn’t sell Greenland to the US. Hello? Greenland wasn’t for sale. The US no longer buys populated countries. The state visit had been planned for months. He has repeatedly told senior officials to explore using nuclear bombs to stop hurricanes hitting the US. He believes video games cause mass shootings. He thinks climate change is no big deal. He says trade wars are “good and easy to win”. He insists it’s Chinese rather than US consumers who pay his tariffs. He “orders” American firms to stop doing business in China. He calls the chairman of the Federal Reserve an “enemy.” He retweets a comedian’s sick suggestion that the Clintons were responsible for the suicide of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein."

I think we have to face the truth that no one seems to want to admit. This is no longer a case of excessive narcissism or grandiosity. We’re not simply dealing with an unusually large ego.

The president of the United States is seriously, frighteningly, dangerously unstable. And he’s getting worse by the day.

Such a person in the Oval Office can do serious damage.

What to do? We can vote him out of office in 14 months’ time. But he could end the world in seven and a half seconds.

There’s also the question of whether he’ll willingly leave.

Can you imagine the lengths he will go to win? Will he get Russia to do more dirty work? Instruct the justice department to arrest his opponent? Issue an executive order banning anyone not born in the US from voting? Start another war?

By the time the courts order him to cease whatever unconstitutional effort he’s making to remain in office, the election may be over. Or he’ll just ignore the courts.

It’s almost too late for an impeachment. Besides, no president has ever been sent packing. Nixon resigned because he saw it coming. Trump would sooner start a civil war.

Also, being unstable is not an impeachable offense.

Two Republicans who have announced primary challenges to him have suggested another possibility: the 25th amendment.

Former Massachusetts governor Bill Weld recently tweeted that Trump is “a clear and present danger” to the US, with the hashtag “#25thAmendment.” Former Illinois representative Joe Walsh says the amendment should be “looked at.”

...Pray that we make it through the next 14 months. Then do everything in your power to remove this man from office.