Neither President Joe Biden or Former President Donald Trump are on the ballot in the midterm elections in 2022. Trump's constant wailing added to Biden’s dramatic warning that the MAGA Trump “Republican” Party posed an existential authoritarian threat to the nation, has ensured that the midterms will decide, in the terminology of Biden, “The Soul of the Nation”.
Up till now the election narratives were that the “Republicans” were challenging Biden’s disastrous Presidency, victim Trump was claiming it was about officially putting him back in the WhiteHouse while Biden just stayed mum because he was ostensibly in such a weak position. But the options of the former President are running out. He lost his bid to overturn the 2020 election and his foot soldiers are facing long jail terms while daily his illegal activities are being exposed. The undisguised threat is that there will be violence if Trump is once again “cheated” but how and what is vague. In short he is desperate as his world seems to be coming apart at the seams and the political climate is tense and uncertain.
With the mood and events changing Biden leaped right in and warned in stark terms that Trump and his MAGA crowd were jettisoning democracy. His intervention was timed with Democrat fortunes on the rise, his own numbers up with Trump’s legal and political woes spreading like wild fire. In fact by going after Trump by name Biden ensured that the latter would redouble his efforts to make the election about his claim to the Presidency, an approach at odds with the “Republican” establishment who want to make it all about senile Biden. By provoking the MAGA monarch Biden would keep the focus on Trump thereby helping buck the historical trend where, in the midterms, the WhiteHouse Presidential Party loses legislatively. Biden sensing the historical flexion point America was at switched his message to the very reason that had motivated him to run in the first place - the racist march in Charlottesville. Trump had claimed there were some very good people amongst the violent crowd who were screaming, “The Jews Won’t Replace Us”. Biden announced his candidature maintaining that, “… this was not who we were” and has continued to claim "we" are about the evolving American story,
TRUMP RAGES ON BUT THE REPUBLICANS STILL SEEM ON TRACK TO WIN THE HOUSE
The “Republicans” have tried to shut Trump up so they can concentrate on the “Disaster of the Biden Presidency”. There was no way that Trump was going to allow this to happen. Trump knows, as do the weak “Republican” legislature leadership that he controls the “Republican” base and they are first and foremost MAGA Trumpists. The “Republican” pathetic flag bearers are also acutely aware that they cannot win the midterms with what amounts, at most, to thirty to thirty- five percent that represent the MAGA electorate. The additional votes have to be delivered by the non MAGA “GOP”. To have a chance the “Republicans” must make the economy central as well as the other “disastrous” Biden policies. However the crucial swing groups don’t need reminding daily that the Forty - Fifth President is off the rails and that the central issue is that he still is the real President. Trump with Biden egging him on will see to it they have no choice.
Up till now there has been a kinda stale mate with Biden nursing his low approval ratings shutting up and allowing the megalomaniacal Trump to steadily eat away at what hope the “Republicans” had of winning the Senate. Trump is openly fighting McConnell who sees himself losing grip on power, he so desperately craves, as the “MAGA” Trump Senate nominees fritter away their chances in key Senate races such as Arizona, Georgia, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania and even making North Carolina, Ohio and Florida move to just “lean Republican”. However the House seemed safely in the hands of MAGA McCarthy with all the gerrymandering and voter suppression ensuring at least a turnover of the half a dozen seats needed to control the House of Representatives. In so doing McCarthy would kibosh any further advances of the Biden agenda, entrench authoritarianism, (“semi fascism”) and yes impeach Biden!. He also probably would erect statues of Trump on a horse in every town square in America.
But circumstances are slowly changing in a number of directions.
SOCIAL POLICY - THE “GOP” GOT WHAT THEY WISHED FOR NO ABORTIONS AND ALL THE GUNS THEY DREAMED OF
The Supreme Court that the “Republicans” had fought for was finally put into place by MAGA Trump. Suddenly the individual rights to choose that America was supposed to be all about were unceremoniously axed. No more freedom of choice including provisions that were akin to the sacrificing of women in dangerous childbirth situations. The “Republican” barbarism that their ill thought out ban on what amounted to all circumstances of abnormal menstrual bleeding which could represent a life or death situation or a delayed period was accompanied with open threats to the right to contraception, gay and interracial marriage and banning of other acts pf “privacy”.
These Supreme Court decisions added to the floodgates of money that the Robert’s Court had already opened together with an invitation for States to do what they like with voting rights. Hysteria followed as all had proudly owned MAGA Trump’s abortion achievement. They believed this is what the women of America really wanted and the suburban women that had left Trump in 2020 would flock back in appreciation. Then the chickens came home to roost.The fuddy duddy old men who controlled the Republican State legislatures had received the go ahead to once and for all keep women in their place and draconian legislation was enacted with unforeseen tragic outcomes.
The reaction to this hubris by the misogynists was swift. Red “Republican” Kansas in a referendum on the issue of abortion, by sixty to forty majority, opted for a women’s right to choose. A Republican seat in a NY bye election switched Democrat and the most high profile disaster was when Sarah Palin, MAGA card carrier deluxe, with Trump rallies behind her, lost a seat in Alaska that the Republicans had held for seventy years. Suddenly the number of wringing endorsements for banning all “abortions” even those that were miscarriages started disappearing from web sites of the House “Republican” candidates. But it was too late.
Throughout the country women are registering to vote in never before seen numbers. Ironically they are seeing this for what it is a deprivation of rights. Abortion has always been a complicated issue with strong religious and medical overtones. Now it is inclusive of ectopic pregnancy, eleven year rape victims, miscarriages, and even conception. Medications that are used for rheumatoid arthritis and menopause and the like are being withheld as they are also used as treatment of medical abortions.
The inhumanity, cruelty, authoritarianism, arrogance, misogyny, ignorance that the “men” have foist on society is staggering. Just to give one of many examples of the paternalism and insensitivity of one of the many leading protagonists of the pro life movement Texas Governor Abbot, who already had banned “abortions” after six weeks of a missed period - a time when most women have not yet had a pregnancy diagnosed. Abbot under pressure has made a concession, women who are raped have now been given a reprieve, if they report it of course, by allowing to take the Plan B pill the next morning. The latter would interfere with conception.
In some ways the sexist attitude surrounding the issue is a proxy for the very issue Biden has highlighted - freedom of choice and the non interference in individuals lives. The “Republicans” need to hold educational classes on the Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution passed over a hundred years ago giving women the franchise. They may also want to pour over the First Amendment which separates church from state.
Obviously with the unexpected reaction by even “pro life” women who believe that women who have miscarriages or are raped or who even choose not to go through with a pregnancy for any reason are entitled to their decision has rocked the MAGA "Republicans". It is really no one else’s business to foist their value system and even religious beliefs on what has to be a painful, stressful and even life threatening situation. That is certainly not what the Founders had in mind!
The taking of women for granted is not the only change in the political landscape.
TRUMP GOING FROM BAD TO WORSE
Politically and legally Trump continued going backwards. Three of his key nominees for Senate were in disastrous shape. The “Republican” generic vote went from plus four to minus four, the polls reflected Biden now leading Trump by fifty percent versus forty three percent. The cult leader with his Red Caps was holding his MAGA rallies but the themes were still his victimization by Biden, the Justice Department and the FBI and that his beautiful Mar a Largo had been raided cutting down the number of place where he could reside as he had been illegally evicted from the WhiteHouse. He could not be laughed off by the “Republican” Establishment because two hundred and fifty candidates for key positions in the midterm election backed his supposition that he had been robbed in 2020. Apparently the official position of the “Republican” Party is that Top Secret documents and the nuclear codes are perfectly safe at Mar a Lago in Trump’s desk.
Legally the revelation that he had hidden classified documents at his Country Club resulted in more condemnation notably from former Attorney General Barr who had carried his water for so long. In fact there is no defense to the crime. Even though the Federalist nominated Judge by delaying the investigation to appoint a Master to ensure that his personal love letters to Kim Jun Un were not read by the Justice Department will provide some respite. In the words of Trump’s mentor Roy Cohn, “Don’t tell me what the law is tell me who the Judge is”.Although Trump used the search warrant to rally his troops there is not any indication that it swung one non MAGA voter to back the “Republican” cause in the midterms which ostensibly this is all about. Every “Republican” candidate must be made to answer whether they want this, at kindest, irresponsible politician, as head of their Party and their next Presidential candidate,
The classified information was such a scandal the world forgot Trump was already on the ropes with his other legal dramas that were unfolding everywhere. In addition he was losing the public opinion battle on the January 6 insurrection. The House January 6 investigation had shown a wide spread conspiracy to suppress the will of the electorate by preventing the transferring of power.
In addition between now and the November elections the January 6 Committee are going to provide more public revelations of the conspiracy. None of this can result in a trove of voters flocking to MAGA Trump who whether MAGA McCarthy likes it or not is the face of his party.
It also didn’t help the cause that Biden had found his voice
BIDEN
President Biden with a number of legislative victories under his belt, in Jeffersonian terms, let the nation know the fork in the road they were now facing. Speaking in front of Independence Hall he spelt out the options the country faced - an evolving democracy or a “semi fascist” state. Trump only believed in elections that he won otherwise he was cheated and was entitled to remain in power. In record time Biden was back on the campaign trail in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania the Democrats best pick up chances for the Senate,
With his allusions to the dark cloud that was threatening the country Biden hammered home the threats of violence that had been implied should Trump be indicted. Suddenly as he moved across the Rust Belt Biden he became the news, Trump’s same old same old was getting just that old. He upped the rhetoric claiming that it was Biden who was the threat as well as his appointed head of the FBI. Trump all but promised pardons for the jailed “patriots” who had fought to overturn the election thereby implicitly giving the go ahead to the next lot.
Biden is on a roll. His numbers are creeping up, the job numbers increase and the MAGA guys are between a rock and a hard place. Those in close races can’t win without Trump and certainly will lose with him
WHERE TO NOW?
Now before Jay H. Ell gets carried away the odds makers still heavily favor the “GOP” to win the House but many are a least conceding the door is slightly ajar for a surprise. Eight weeks in a political campaign is a long time.
The fact that Trump is alive and kicking is a devastating indictment of the American Judicial System. If after seven decades it catches up with him he is quite prepared to lead from behind and fight to the last MAGA cult member.
AT THE END OF THE DAY
It still is a long long way to November but the days will roll by quickly when they reach October.
No one not anybody knows how this cookie will crumble.
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