RON DESANTIS - THE NEW WHITE KNIGHT - THE RON v THE DON

 

Ron DeSantis, (THE RON), the Florida Governor is out Trumping Trump, (THE DON), as the fight for the Republican nomination for the 2024 Presidential election becomes more and more tense. While the list of wannabes grows longer and longer, the Nikki Halleys and the Mike Pences of the world can all stand on their heads, The Ron has gulped all the oxygen out of the air in the "GOP” Presidential nominee stakes versus The Don. The Don made clear his hat was in the ring this last weekend calling DeSantis "disloyal" if he runs. 

The Primary will be decided by the “GOP” base. Those that generally pitch up are the radical right and the Evangelicals. Whatever the Evangelical leadership might say Trump’s approval rating is about thirty percent and that just about adds up to the number of Americans that vote in the "GOP” Primary. In case anyone still believed this is no longer Trump’s Party they should have taken a gander at the election for Chairmanship of the Republican National Committee with all three candidates trying to be more Trumpier than than the other two.

 So The Don with legal problems that would have bothered Al Capone, has to still be the favorite to win this sh-t show. The Don in spite of having his most influential supporter being  “My Kevin” McCarthy who is making a royal idiot of himself as the Speaker and who needed an embarrassing fifteen votes to be elected. “My Kevin” is trying to operate from ring to ring in his unsynchronized three ring circus. So at best Kevin will be running himself ragged for two years as he attempts to abolish the Internal Revenue Service and introduce a thirty percent sales tax on the bread and eggs his electorate purchase. All the rich have to do is to cut down on the number of yachts they buy. He is being more divisive than his patron so he can't be much assistance and if he survives two years it will be a miracle. 

JUST MAYBE JUST MAYBE IT WON’T BE THE DON

However it just may not be The Don for one reason or another, whether it be AG Garland or the "My Kevin" albatross.  Maybe, just maybe, perhaps AG Garland will do what he said he was going to do and what the Proud Boy Defendants in their defense on Seditious Conspiracy charges claim he hasn’t done. Their argument is that the low ranking followers of Trump are having their fates tried by juries while, he, (Trump), runs for President! 

AG Garland prevaricated for nearly two years before appointing a Special Counsel to investigate Trump. However if he accepts the referral from the January 6 Committee to charge The Don as an insurrectionist then if found guilty he could not run for office. (As Jay H. Ell pointed out in his last blog Garland can act expeditiously if he is so inclined. He didn’t wait two weeks before appointing a Special Counsel to investigate Biden. By the way the two week time frame is running out on the appointment of a Special Counsel to probe Mike Pence).

 Ms. Fani Willis, an African American Attorney General in Georgia, however, is “immimently” about to put The Don out of his misery and charge him. This may not be enough to cause a dent in Trump’s support as he will scream victimhood. For those that buy that garbage they should consult The Proud Boys and The OathKeepers who are facing twenty year sentences for their loyalty to The Don while he plays golf at Mar- A - Lago and dines with anti semites and white supremacists, 

So after all that Jay H. Ell diversion, The Ron has to be considered a serious candidate either if The Don can’t run and in the miraculous event that between now and July 2024 he can win the Republican Primary against Trump. Polls that include likely “GOP” voters give him a chance. It would be more impressive if they were of likely Primary “GOP” voters. 

DESANTIS - THE RON - IS NO PANACEA FOR THE “GOP”

Now to finally get to the point Jay H. Ell has been trying to make - for those who believe anybody is better than The Don - they better think again because The Ron will not lead them to the Promised Land. Trump will say or do anything to get elected and he can read the electorate.  His position on abortion is no longer absolute. He claims that the reason the “GOP” did so badly in the midterms was because they did not have any exceptions to allow for a termination of a pregnancy. Trump has chastised DeSantis for his revisionist history on Covid and he has warned “My Kevin” the Speaker of the House not to touch Medicare and Social Security which is the position of the loonies that control the “GOP” asylum.   

The Ron is a sophisticated totalitarian racist who is ruling Florida like a medieval tyrant. Moreover he is non believer in science. In fairness to DeSantis he doesn’t pretend. He is about half Biden’s age, forty - four years, so it could be argued that he is too young to be President! His national career spans less than a decade. He has not been tested on the national arena and many feel The Don will eat him up alive. 

THE DESANTIS RESUME - SHORT BUT SWEET

The Ron has no pretensions to being one of the people. In fact he is part of the much maligned elite. Harvard and Yale are in his resume then to add to the list a brief military tour with a couple of medals. Politically he didn’t mess around and in 2012 he stood for Congress and was immediately a vocal member of the Freedom Caucus. He was on several important Committees and made all the appropriate noises to stamp him as a Trumpist and vociferously anti Obama. 

The Ron supported The Don and ironically the latter supported him in his run for Governorship in 2018. DeSantis won the latter by the skin of his teeth and gained national notoriety by obliquely alluding to his African American opponent as a monkey. An allegation he naturally denied with all the force at his command.  Within the short space of five years he has filled the vacuum of the bankrupt "GOP” leadership bench creating his own brand of racism, authoritarianism, cultural nihilism and anti scientism. In a State that has become crimson red he waltzed into his second term as Governor by twenty points. 

Needless to say this dramatic domination of the third largest state in America has catapulted The Ron onto the national scene making headlines with his radical moves at eliminating opposing philosophies, making the State Courts and Universities “Conservative” and defining what should or should not be taught in schools. His mantra is that white children should not be ashamed that they are white! But there is so much more.

THE DESANTIS LINE.   

The Florida Governor has regularly grabbed the headlines and is for practical purposes the face of the MAGA Trumpist position even out Trumping Trump whose eponymous policy is where the “GOP” are at. While Trump is obsessed with the stolen election DeSantis is methodically spelling out right wing lines that are going to be very difficult to outflank. That would only become relevant if Trump is not a viable candidate.

THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS COVID - VACCINATIONS ARE JUST A WAY TO CONTROL THE MASSES 

  It all started with Covid. The Ron with all his degrees from Harvard and Yale became the leader of the anti science group with other “GOP” luminaries such as Majorie Taylor Greene who believes the earth is flat. The latter is in charge of a Select Committee, created in exchange for her miserable vote for “My Kevin”, to investigate “The Pandemic”. Perhaps Majorie will call DeSantis in as an expert witness. He will detail to the “Pandemic” Committee that he appointed as his Secretary of Health, Joseph Lapado, MD, one of the few leaders in the Medical Profession who was a vaccine denier. 

Lapado was not exactly highly regarded by his Supervisor in California who refused to provide him with a reference. Dr. Carol Mangione stated she was aware of “derogatory information” on then candidate Lapado. She further stated that in her opinion she had no confidence in his “honesty, integrity and ability”. It wasn’t long before Lapado was attacked mercilessly by the University of Florida’s Subcommittee on Florida Health Policy. Academics at this level are usually very circumspect in their criticism of colleagues’ work. Not so with Dr. Lapido, stating in a detailed review that his policy and analysis were of “highly questionable merit”.

So when Majorie calls The Ron to give evidence on “The Pandemic” he can bring Dr. Lapido along to give credibility to his “science”. She believes as must The Ron that vaccination is one big hoax, led by the Democratic Puppet Fauci, to control the masses.

DESANTIS ON ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION - GIVE THE DEMOCRATIC STATES A CHANCE

Illegal Immigration and the porous border is a hot topic and even though Trump’s “Build That Wall” is more than passe the issue isn’t. Our The Ron had a unique solution and even though there has been no follow through it garnered him the headlines he knows he needs constantly to be the presumptive challenger to The Don.  Florida at the time of his stunt didn’t have an “illegal” situation even though a large amount of the Presidential wannabe’s support comes from what he must define as “illegal” Cuban immigrants. So before the current “illegals” invaded the Florida Keys he illegally commandeered dozens from Texas, lying to them that “nirvana" lay in the North East where he flew them in a chartered flight costing Texas tax payers twelve million dollars. When there was no reception committee for the ‘“illegals”, who felt even more discombobulated in supposedly  Democratic Martha’s Vineyard, our The Ron washed his hands off the whole affair. At least as a result of his callous maneuver everyone knew where he stood on illegal immigration 

DESANTIS ON ABORTION - “THE LIVES OF FLORIDA’S MOST VULNERABLE” 

On signing the Bill to prohibit abortion after an unborn child has reached fifteen weeks of gestation, DeSantis claimed that babies in the womb, “Who have beating hearts, who can see and who can feel pain” will be saved. Of course the latter claim is scientifically unfounded. If he had bothered to read the amicus brief of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists who provided detailed scientific proof to the American Supreme Court that the very earliest fetuses may experience pain is twenty - four or twenty five weeks, he would have known his rationale was a lie. But why should The Ron care if The Don’s Supreme Court Justices cared even less.So he has promised even further action to limit abortion in his State. On this key issue for the Evangelicals he has to reckon that he just has to come through solidly enough to reassure the fundamentalists that their cause will be front and central.

BUT THE RON'S BIGGEST PLATFORM IS BEING ANTI - WOKE

The Merriam Webster defines “WOKE” as follows: “Aware of and actively attentive to important societal issues, (especially issues of racial and social justice”). If you read and listen to DeSantis's rants on the subject no one would ever guess that is what “wokeness” is all about. The RON, in support of  the Florida  STOP THE WOKE ACT, defined it as “Stop the Wrongs to Our Kids and Employees. He claimed that “We won’t allow Florida tax dollars to be spent teaching kids to hate our country and hate each other”

The Ron had already banned Critical Race Theory and the 1619 Project in Florida schools. In fairness to DeSantis he could not define those concepts either. He does however know what Woke ideology is not -“We reject woke ideology. We feel normalcy, not philosophical lunacy. We will not allow reality, facts and truth to become optional. We will never surrender to the woke mob. Florida is where woke goes to die”. Woke incidentally includes Disney, Apple and PayPal. 

Continuing the crusade against wokeness is The Ron’s sanctioned HB 1467, which requires books in the school classroom or library to be pre-approved materials or vetted by a media specialist trained by Florida’s Department of Education. Violations of this statute are third degree felonies. Adding to this law is the banning of an optional college credit on African American studies which he declared as a “political agenda”.

New College is a tiny public liberal arts College in Sarasota, Florida which institution no -one would have ever heard of till The Ron put it on the national scene.  He appointed six new trustees all of whom agree with his anti woke agenda. There is a Private College in Michigan called Hillsdale College which is considered the nation's benchmark of illiberalism. The characterization of DeSantis’s push is that he wants to make a public university, New College, the Hillsdale of the South. America will know that The Ron has won out when Clarence Thomas gives the Commencement speech at New College as he has done at Hillsdale.

Jay H. Ell could go on and on with the lunacy which is really a dogwhistle to being anti African American. The Don would not go there to this extent because some of best friends are African American anti - semites. The Ron’s calculation is that this will drive out the white coalition that magically put Trump in the WhiteHouse in 2016. Where he gets that “wokeness” from has to be from a focus group composed of the Hillsdale College Faculty. However it keeps him on the front page at least when The Don isn’t. 

If the choice boils down to DeSantis v Trump the real GOP is history. There apparently is no adult in the “GOP” room to right the ship. The Bushes hibernate in Texas and McConnell is taking sadistic glee at watching McCarthy squirm. McConnell is looking to 2024 where in this bizarre antiquated system of American democracy the Senate looks like it will become “GOP” with a minority of votes while the Democrats win the WhiteHouse and regain the House of Representatives with an ever increasing majority.

AT THE END OF THE DAY.

DeSantis’s anti woke policy has a deep insidious objective - a denial of history. This has profound implications. It is even worse than revisionist history, which at least recognizes that an event took place and distorts the interpretation. 

In a “GOP” where the insanely fraudulent George Santos is the daily public persona of the party, where Majorie Taylor Greene and Jim Jordan call the shots and where DeSantis is the last white hope, the future is hopeless. The politically and morally bankrupt “GOP’ have to disintegrate in the not too distant future. 

The sane members of the “GOP", like Governors Sununu and Hogan may as well stay at home. All the other sane members of the party have left already. They are part of the Lincoln Group or The Bulwark or have joined the Democratic Party. Each of them feeling guilty at allowing this to happen, except McConnell, who is hanging in there because even if it is Trump he will bite his tongue and elect more anti woke judges.  

The Don still is the figurehead of the party. He controls the base. Unless the anti woke DeSantis defeats him and or the spineless Attorney General charges him with Insurrection so he cannot run again, he is still in charge, The Don, Jay H. Ell  believes would win the Republican nomination  even if convicted of any other felony. The Ron is an establishment elitist. His choice of being anti woke, a term he or none of his electorate fully understand or cares about, tells it all!

The good news for The Ron is that, for the moment, Fox News, supports him. 

All that a despondent Jay H. Ell can do is quote Joe Biden's ending to all his speeches, “….  may God bless America and may God protect our troops!”.

SHOULD GERIATRIC JOE TAKE ONE FOR THE TEAM?

 

America owes Joe Biden a deep debt of gratitude. History will credit him for turning around America’s trajectory towards totalitarianism and for marshaling the forces of liberal democracy against Russian aggression, genocide and neo colonial fascism. Furthermore he is one of the five transformational Presidents in the last hundred and twenty five years, joining Teddy and Franklin Roosevelt. LBJ and Reagan.

 In case anyone believers that the aspirational liberal democracy as described in the Founding Father’s documents has won out, stick around and listen to Trump and his chief challenger Governor DeSantis, who has refined Trumpiism, alternate history, racism, identity politics and authoritarianism to a new level. Biden orchestrated his message both in 2020 and 2022 on the fact that “that is not who we are”. And the message and the messenger have resonated. The message and the messenger need continuity.

Biden’s achievements stand in contrast to a rudderless amoral political opposition who don’t possess an original thought, are chained to their leader who is a pathological liar and who is under serious legal jeopardy. Trump’s apologists, who are led by craven Speaker McCarthy, have made it abundantly clear that the next two years are going to be devoted to smearing Biden, his family and his administration. Also they are playing games with the American economy by refusing to pay America's debts as mandated by the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution. A Constitution that they claim that they are wedded to. 

Unhappily for the aged President fate has thrown him a curve ball in that classified documents, were found amongst his papers dating back to his Vice Presidency over six years ago and his Senatorship dating from the seventies. They were unearthed in an old office and in subsequent searches at his home.

 While the circumstances are entirely different from Trump’s admitted seizure of classified documents and then his refusal to hand them over, McCarthy and his band will use the Biden saga as yet another reason to “investigate” Biden up the ying yang. The "GOP" inquisition will gain credence by the fact that the Attorney General has appointed a Special Counsel to probe into  the classified material found in Biden’s possession. This even before Biden invited him to search his home. What will not help the “GOP” cause is the fact that their inquisitors are types who spout conspiratorial garbage such as Hillary Clinton and the Democrats were running a child sex ring from a pizza parlor.

However the document epic has added impetus to the controversy as to whether the elderly Biden should or should not run for a second term. There are those argue that the Special Counsel investigation will complicate the Democratic chances in 2024  and that he should bow out and take one for the team. 

JUSTICE SECRETARY GARLAND’S “RUSH TO JUSTICE”

The finding of a total of thirty classified documents in Biden’s half century of elected office has resulted in the creation of a false equivalency between the thus far squeaky clean Biden and the criminally soaked Donald Trump. 

The fear of a just a taint of favoritism has motivated the obsessionally impartial Attorney General to order a Special Counsel into the Biden saga. Any reasonable jurist will argue on the basis of what is known that Biden had no criminal intent whereas Trump has admitted his. Put another way a Special Counsel is appointed where criminality is suspected. In Biden’s case he reported the “crime” to the National Archives and the Justice Department immediately on discovering the documents and then instigated and invited searches to see if there were any more. Trump on the other hand admitted that he took three hundred classified documents, refused to return them, previously denied that he had them and then objected that classified documents were found and seized in an FBI court ordered search.

 In spite of the obvious differences the House Republicans are crying fowl because Garland didn’t immediately order the FBI to “raid” Biden’s home. Rather without a subpoena the FBI went through every nook and cranny of Biden’s residence looking at records over a fifty year period. Biden can confidently swear that there are no more classified documents that can be found yet Trump probably has more secreted away in other residences.  

Garland and his Special Counsel for Biden have already been subject to vicious attacks from the “GOP” even though Attorney Hur has impeccable Republican credentials and was appointed by Trump. Hur has donated to Republican electoral candidates and appeared at a Trump WhiteHouse Press Conference. In spite of Hur’s political bent,  Kash Patel, Trump’s spokesperson screamed at Garland’s appointment of this Republican operative, “This guy is a swamp monster of the tier one level. He’s a government gangster. He’s now in charge of the continued crime scene cover up. “ 

It is over two years since Trump’s coup terminated in the January 6 insurrection. The January 6 Committee laid bare the conspiracy that was perpetrated by the Forty - Fifth President and his inner circle. Yet to date all Garland has done is charge the foot soldiers. Members of the January 6 Committee expressed their frustration as Garland’s resources and subpoena power outstrips that of their Committee and there was little evidence, till recently, that he was pursuing the conspiracy that effected the sustained attempt to keep Trump in power.

One gets the distinct feeling that Garland has a need to impress the Republicans as being impartial and has been loathe to investigate the MAGA "GOP" ring leaders of the coup. Only after thoroughly investigating Trump did the Attorney General appoint a Special Counsel. Presumably he did so as there was enough evidence to show probable cause that crimes had been committed. This is in stark contrast to his prompt probe into the Democratic President. The Washington Post investigation has indicated that Biden’s team were shocked at Garland’s action as he has cooperated fully with the Department of Justice. 

Special Counsels are supposed to be appointed for criminal investigations. There is no way that that the Department of Justice could have had enough material to believe that there was probable cause of Biden criminal activity. Anyone reporting their own “crimes” could have not had any intent to commit them.

The "non political" Garland has made a political decision in an effort to forestall criticism by the Republicans. He need not have bothered because he and his appointments have been subject to the most outrageous invective.

The problem with Special Counsel investigations besides the implicit stain that they impart, is they take an interminable time. So like with Trump this will be continually be a news item.The chips are beginning to fall in a way that this controversy is consuming center stage threatening all the progress Biden has made. At every opportunity, regardless of the occasion and venue the press are bombarding the current President with questions about the documents. Polls indicate that at this stage a large section of the electorate view the two situations on a par.

What with all the investigations that the House Republicans are going to devise as well as the Special Counsel probe, there is a feeling that the Democrats would be better off  with a new candidate in 2024. 

The upshot of all of this is to reopen the call for Biden to step down and take one for the team.

SO  SHOULD GERIATRIC JOE TAKE ONE FOR THE TEAM?

 It is in a way a slap in the face to Biden to call for his departure and it can be argued that it is a betrayal of his loyalty and personal sacrifice in standing for election in the first place. But political reality is not for the faint hearted. Sometimes circumstances dictate outcome and maybe they are beginning to overtake Biden. Circumstances have changed in the past few weeks. The rationale of Biden’s detractors is that they don’t need to be on the defensive arguing that Biden's situation is not the same as Trump’s. To the lay person they appear similar, 

However this is not the argument being put forward by those who are looking for an alternate candidate. It is rather Biden’s biological age and obliquely his mental status.

 The smears against his cognition are just that smears. It is being pointed out that the highly successful trio of Democratic Leaders of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, Bill Hoyer and Jim Clyburn have stepped down from their top three leadership positions, in favor of younger candidates. Joseph Biden will be as old as they are at the start of 2024 run. They have recognized that while they still have their marbles and  know how the other members of the caucus have to be able to reach the jackpot. Moreover the youth demographic in the recent elections has increased and they identify more with younger leadership. The eighteen to thirty - five year old demographic favor the Democrats over the GOP by at least twenty five percent.

The opinion makers and policy wonks in the Democratic Party are begging Biden to spend more than just the weekends in Delaware. The seventy - six year old Robert Reich wrote an op ed in The Guardian entitled, “Joe, Please Don’t Run Again”. Reich claims that it is one’s declining powers as the aging process digs in that worries him most. Reich projects his own failing faculties onto Biden. Whether that projection is accurate or not it is irrelevant because it is being bandied about for every word stumble, whether that can be attributed to his previous stutter or not. 

Reich’s contention, that Biden and his generation, like Gingrich and Clarence Thomas, whom he unflatteringly lumps himself and Biden with, have fucked things up, is ridiculous. Biden is Plato’s original definition of a politician. In a world that has moved at a breath taking speed, he has always been slightly ahead of the curve. It is so easy to criticize politicians who be their very nature have to compromise and can only lead as fast as the followers can tolerate change.

James Carville the legendary Democratic strategist arrives at the same conclusion as Reich. Again he uses age as the rationale. Also throwing his five cents worth is geriatric David Gergen advisor to four Presidents including Ronald Reagan who was reported to only work a few hours a day. Gergen had nothing to say then. 

It seems that it is mainly the geriatrics who are projecting their decreasing cognition onto Biden whose achievements are greater than any of the last ten Commanders in Chief.

THE ARGUMENT FOR BIDEN

 Biden is the most qualified and politically savvy candidate around. The Democrats legislators are backing him.The leader of the Democratic House Caucus Pramilla Jayapal enthusiastically exclaimed that although he wasn’t even her second choice in 2020 she is fully behind him now. 

Biden is not the typical US President. He has not great oratorical powers. He is not charismatic. However his genuineness and empathy allowed him to connect with a wide range of constituencies and he was able to cobble together a coalition that won him the presidency. There is every reason to believe he can expand on that. His approval rating has increased from thirty six to forty - four percent which believe it or not is pretty good for a politician in 2022. 

Biden’s legislative record rivals that of LBJ. Unlike LBJ, he has delivered with the barest of majorities. He has navigated the agendas of a wide constituency within his own party, while he has cobbled bipartisan deals against all odds. 

 There are very few if any of the prospective candidates that assuredly can deliver the African American vote, the worker vote that won him Georgia, Pennsylvania and Michigan while hanging on to the Democratic coalition of minorities such as the LGBT groups. All pundits were waiting to hear from Jim Clyburn the kingmaker from South Carolina who was instrumental in catapulting Biden into the Democratic nomination in 2020. They were not disappointed as Clyburn, announced. “I am all in for President Biden:….passing more progressive legislation than any President since Lyndon Baines Johnson….”. He warned against any Democrat running against him in the Primary noting that is what cost Carter reelection in 1980. Incidentally Buchanan did the same to George Bush, 41. 

There is an assumption that McCarthy’s investigations will have a negative impact on Biden. This is based on the defeat of Hillary Clinton by Trump. However McCarthy has delusions of grandeur as Clinton in fact made mincemeat of her tormentors in the Benghazi hearings. McCarthy had FBI Director Comey to thank for announcing the reopening of Clinton’s e mail probe days before the 2016 election. Clinton’s internal polling found that to be the decisive factor. There is every possibility that the fact that McCarthy et al with George Santos in toe, with loonies like Taylor Greene, Boebert, Biggs, Perry, Gospar and Jordan holding forth will backfire. Biden has been preparing for these hearings for two years. If anything Biden will turn the inquisition on Its head.

Biden may have to change his Vice Presidential running mate. Kamala Harris does not appear to have gained traction with a high staff turnover and low demand as a speaker in the midterms. Biden could call on Pete Butttigieg who is the sharpest tool in his cabinet shed. His youth and oratory skills may well bring out the youth vote. If as a member of the LGBT he won the snow white rural Iowa caucuses he has to have a message that resonates. 

Biden with the pressure on him will be facing tough negotiations over the raising of the debt ceiling. He faces Speaker McCarthy whose future as Speaker depends on not yielding an inch, Biden has the problem in the Senate of Sinema and Manchin, two Democrats who are in favor of sitting down with the cynical “GOP”. The latter had no difficulty in raising the debt ceiling three times in the Trump stretch. Added to that the current deficit is in part due to the Trump tax cut for the rich and for the corporations. Stick around and see a quiet master at work. 

How Biden maneuvers is never transparent as he knows better than anyone else that giving a running commentary and or criticizing those who are holding out against him is counter productive.

AT THE END OF THE DAY

At the end of the year who will be standing, McCarthy or Biden?

 What expenditure does McCarthy want to cut? The Military Budget? Social Security? Medicare? Medicaid? Let McCarthy announce what he wants discussions about?. Trump has warned McCarthy to leave Medicare and Social Security alone, which are the two big items the Speaker has his eye on. 

McCarthy has questions to answer why he was complicit in Santos’s fraud prior to his election to Congress. 

Garland anxious not to appear biased will be mercilessly attacked anyway when he announces that Trump’s Special Counsel recommends charges and Biden’s does not. 

If there is any double standard it is the deference afforded to citizen Trump as opposed to President Biden. Garland stuck around for years before gaining a court order to search Trump’s residence but within days wanted to “raid” the Biden’s residence -  the latter invited him in. 

Maybe Biden would have been better off with William Barr.

Biden has no need to take one for the team. He is THE reason that there is a winning team. 

“MY KEVIN” AND THE GOP CRAZIES - REDEEM TRUMP AND DENY COUP ATTEMPT

 

Former President Trump failed to persuade  Acting Attorney General Rosen to, “Just say the election was corrupt and leave the rest up to me and the Republican Congressmen”. (Rosen had replaced Bill Barr whose forced resignation followed Barr's categorical assessment that Trump’s claims of voter fraud were “bullshit”). 

Trump then tried to replace Rosen with Jeffrey Clark, a civil attorney with no judicial experience, who had been recommended to him by Republican Congressman Scott Perry. Clark was quite amenable to write to the Georgian State officials stating that the election was corrupt and a lot more. A heated and protracted meeting then followed  in the Oval Office where Trump was informed should he go through with his plan to appoint Clark hundreds of Department of Justice officials would resign. The Chief White House Counsel, Pat Cipollone, called Clark’s letter a “murder - suicide” pact and Trump eventually backed off. 

This episode left everyone wondering who the Republican Congressmen Trump was referring to. Last week America found out. In addition to Perry there were nineteen others. The Guardian labelled them the Taliban Twenty. Trump’s gut as usual was right. Those twenty could bully the other two hundred Republican Congresspeople and Trump’s Kevin McCarthy into anything. In effect the whole lot were "Trump's Republicans".

The underlying narrative to the whole shameful episode of the Speaker election was to whitewash Trump and investigate the investigators into the coup, which Trump's Republicans implicitly were denying ever happened. This squalid deception was being perpetrated in the very same chamber where police responders were killed and maimed defending their miserable lying lives. The fact that this was the Second Anniversary of the January 6 insurrection was totally lost on the Republican caucus as they squabbled and fought among themselves. 

WAITING FOR A SPEAKER

This past week America witnessed a Kafaesque drama in the House. President Biden on the other hand was blissfully was playing out his bipartisan role, with Senator McConnell in attendance. Biden was dishing out infrastructure money to build bridges physically and metaphorically. Simultaneously on the steps of the Capitol, the outgoing Speaker of the House Democrat Nancy Pelosi and the Democratic caucus were commemorating the bravery and loss of life in the Trump inspired assault on democracy. Only one Republican Congressman was present. Soon after Biden  dished out medals to the police who had physically defended Republican and Democratic legislators and their staff on January 6, 2021. 

The House Republicans were blind to all these happenings and instead participated in a real life farce in what should have been a formality - the coronation of the caucus’s decision on who should be their leader. Instead Kevin McCarthy was kept waiting for his speakership which, at least, unlike Godot, finally arrived albeit it took fifteen attempts. Trump, not to be denied a role on this production on Capitol Hill played a key part, according to McCarthy, in him realizing his speakership ambition. 

The question arising out of this public internecine battle of the dying “GOP” is what does it all mean and where do we go from here? One answer for sure is that the House GOP have abandoned liberal democracy in favor of anarchy, Their  immediate objective is to run cover for Trump and deny the coup and their role in the conspiracy. The five day production on the House floor was dominated by the twenty “GOP” right wing anarchists who the British daily, The Guardian, labelled “The Taliban 20”. Newt Gingrich the  former Republican Speaker, who   accelerated his Party’s disintegration in 1994, smugly mused that the GOP had never been such disarray since 1964.

THE GOP LUNATICS ARE IN CHARGE OF ASYLUM

The battle between McCarthy supporters and between the Taliban holdouts for the Speakership of the House of Representatives wasn’t a contest between the administration running the asylum versus the inmates. Rather it was a battle between the inmates as to who would run the institution. Just in case there is any doubt as to the irrationality of this whole episode, without the vote of a Republican sociopathic fraud, George Santos, who claimed his grandparents were holocaust survivors, McCarthy would still be waiting for his Speakership.

Just in case anyone might believe that this was a battle between good and evil the majority of the Republican Conference in the House of Representatives, who participated in this reality show spectacle, challenged the legitimacy of the 2020 Presidential Election in one way or another. This in spite of the facts that Trump lost over sixty of his legal challenges in court, that many of the Trump inspired insurgents have been found guilty of seditious conspiracy, that the January 6 Committee changed public perception about Trump with the over sixty percent of Americans believing that he was responsible for an insurrection and finally. the fact that Trump is being investigated by the Department of Justice for the latter. Added to that litany there are open and shut cases that Trump obstructed the government from obtaining classified documents that he had stolen and that he tried to illegally overturn the Georgia election. 

It should not be surprising that the key dramatis personae in this farce had reflected their consciousness of guilt by requesting pardons from then President Trump in relation to their complicity in his coup. They included, according to Chief of Staff, Mark Meadows's executive assistant, Cassidy Hutchinson, “GOP” Congressmen Mo Brooks, Matt Gates, Andy Biggs, Scott Perry and Majorie Taylor Greene. The latter bragged at a constituency meeting and then posted her braggadocio on a video that had she been organizing January 6, "We would have won and it would have been armed”). Jim Jordan, whose ambition it is to be head of the House Judiciary Committee, asked for a pardon for “members of Congress”. (Presumably for all those who had Trump had in mind when he assured the Acting Attorney General that he could “leave it to him and the Republican Members of Congress”).

For the record seventeen of the twenty original holdouts to the pathetic McCarthy’s quest voted not to ratify the 2020 Presidential election even though though they scuttled for cover when the windows were breaking and the Capitol floors were full of blood.There are approximately 156 current GOP House members who have raised doubts about the validity of the 2020 election. This is an increase from the 147 GOP House members who, in January 2021, voted to object to the certification of the Electoral College, after their lives had been spared by the heroism of the Capitol Police.  

It has to be irony that couldn’t have been scripted that the self same crew of “co conspirators” were maneuvering for influence and power. The aspirant Speaker, Kevin McCarthy had on the day condemned Trump, announcing that he would have no further truck with the Forty - Fifth President. As he screamed at the President, “They are fucking trying to kill me”, to which Trump reportedly replied that, “Well Kevin, I guess, these people, they care more about the election than you do”. 

Well fast forward to two years later when “Well Kevin” became “My Kevin”

"MY KEVIN"

“My Kevin”, was how Trump referred to his new protege during the protracted Speaker election saga as he publicly and privately backed him. Lynne Cheney’s assessment of the would be Speaker was that whenever Kevin was faced with doing the right thing or fulfilling his political ambition, he did the latter. McCarthy made no bones about the fact that he would promise or do anything to attain his life long ambition. He could have had printed on his forehead, “These are my principles. If you don’t like them I have others.”. So off he went to Mar - A - Lago and kissed the ring of Trump as he reckoned that he was still the power behind the”GOP”. Ironically it was "My Kevin", according to GOP Congressman Kitzinger, by his action, that rehabilitated Trump pulling him out of the political gutter.  

The disintegration of the “GOP” played out for all to see as the dissolute lot all jostled for power in their post Trump world. The repetitious farce ran non stop the whole week as Kevin McCarthy ostensibly negotiated with a group of anarchists whose only interest was to break the system of government one way or another. You have to know you are on the Animal Farm when team normal includes Trump’s Republicans Majorie Taylor Greene and Jim Jordan and fraudster George Santos. 

One of the key holdouts Scott Perry has to be a target of the Justice Department for his role in attempting to illegally keep Trump in power. McCarthy, Jim Jordan, Scott Perry and Andy Biggs were referred to the House Ethics Committee for failing to respond to subpoenas issued by the January 6 Investigation Committee. Incidentally McCarthy willingly agreed that the Ethics Committee should be hobbled! Jim Jordan was central at least to discussions with the WhiteHouse on January 6. As Cassidy Hutchinson testified - Jordan was the only person whose calls could interrupt Chief of Staff Meadows while he was conversing with Trump on January 6. 

McCarthy in his victory speech claimed that they would use investigative and subpoena powers to reveal all. Why should anyone take any notice of a Congressional subpoena when he and his colleagues laughed theirs off?

WHAT WAS IN THE DEAL TO GET THE HOLDOUTS TO FINALLY ALLOW MCCARTHY TO FALL OVER THE LINE AND WHAT FOLLOWS? 

Well there are two agendas, the undisclosed and those that the twenty made a public display of. The Taliban Twenty showed no loyalty to their party let alone to their supposed leader who they humiliated hour after hour and day after day, thereby serving notice that the bauble he sort could be easily taken away from him. The final six rebels refused point blank to actually vote for him, merely abstaining from the proceedings thereby lowering the number of votes he needed to become speaker, Their spokesperson Congressman Gaetz gave as his rationale that he couldn’t think of anything more to ask McCarthy for. 

The bottom line is that Kevin McCarthy is Speaker in name only. He can be challenged if one Congressperson so moves. As the gang of six “GOP” rebels move as a pack and as the “GOP” majority only allows him to lose four votes he is in a policy straight jacket - not that he cares. Thus the American electorate will be governed by a minority of a minority of a minority in the House of Representatives. 

The Freedom Caucus, whom the Taliban crowd represents, wants disproportionate representation on the powerful Rules Committee. That is the body that decides what legislation comes to the floor. Then they have a collection of procedural matters which on their face seem reasonable but are designed to see to it they have control of any and every piece of a Bill and amendments. They could also with their demands gum up the works by introducing amendment after amendment on the floor.

On a more down to earth matter McCarthy pledged not to back anyone who stood against these loonies in a primary contest, He controls a rich and powerful Political Action Committee that dished out three hundred million dollars in the midterms. 

Then there are the enquiries they want to initiate which feed into the conspiracy theories of Trump’s “dark state”. The Justice Department which is currently investigating Trump and his co conspirators are about to be investigated themselves. Jim Jordan is demanding the documentation that led to the Mar - A - Lago search, which had been sanctioned by the courts. The Bidens are going to be a focus of taxpayer money. Even more so now that classified documents were found in his old office.  Also there is a provision to scrutinize the “Weaponization” of the Federal Government. Smearing operations are central to McCarthy’s playbook. He maintained that his Benghazi investigation, alleging Hillary Clnton’s negligence, won Trump the election in 2016. Impeachment proceedings against the Secretary for Homeland Security, Attorney General Garland and  Biden have been mooted

The bizarre belief that science is subjective and is used to control the American public will feature as well in the probe into Dr. Fauci’s Covid recommendations. 

There is little doubt that this Congress will be preoccupied with investigations as priority number one is to support their backing of the Trump narrative of a stolen election and that he is being politically targeted. 

The twenty Taliban rebels fiscal demands will result in an exacerbation of the neo liberalism that has brought about the colossal disparities in income with deregulation and low taxes for the rich to give trickle down economics one last try. Going back to 2022 spending levels will mean Welfare Programs such as Medicare and Social Security will be at risk. They even want to abolish taxes and introduce a consumer tax so the poor can subsidize the rich!

Whoever is in power the debt ceiling is nearly always raised in national interest. But national interest is not the interest of the Freedom Caucus. You might have thought McCarthy would have learned from the two Republican Speakers, Boehner and Ryan, with far greater majorities and oodles more political nous, who left because the Freedom Caucus was uncontrollable. The crazies are quite prepared to bring down the American economy.

The good news is none of their legislation will get past the Senate. The bad news is they can still create financial havoc if they refuse to pay America’s debts, where they have de facto veto power.

HOW DOES THIS IMPACT TRUMP?

The conventional wisdom is that the whole episode weakens Trump. The rationale for this assessment is that the twenty rebels failed to respond to Trump’s pleas to vote for McCarthy.  Jay H. Ell disagrees. Trump will argue that “My Kevin” became Speaker. Far more significantly is that, Trumps “Republicans in the Congress” are co conspirators who want to cover their own backs as well.

 Trump will be forced to reenergize his moribund 2024 Presidential election campaign. There is no doubt that “My Kevin” will back him as they had to be a quid pro quo for his support of the most ineffective Speaker of the House in living history. 

The judicial processes against Trump labor on regardless of the machinations of McCarthy et al. Georgia is first up on the agenda and so it should be. One of the embarrassing findings the searchers for “weaponization” will confront is that the majority of those who thwarted Trump were Republicans. 

THE “GOP” MODERATES IN THE HOUSE

The pathetic two hundred who stood by impotent as the twenty road roughshod over their selection for Speaker are not expected to unite and tell them to go to hell. Specifically the eighteen who now represent constituencies that Biden won In 2020 have all, but one, agreed to the Rules package which seals the direction that this Congress is going to go. Unless they wake up they will be history in a Presidential election especially as they all ran on bipartisanship. They have a simple redemption. They simply have to join the Democrats on a debt ceiling issue or whatever to show that they have some spine.

AT THE END OF THE DAY

The new “GOP” ray of hope is that Joe Biden, who has been under investigation by a Trump prosecutor for two months for the finding classified documents in an old office, will counterbalance the Trump coup and his obstruction of justice of his classified documents. 

The next two years are to say the least going to be very telling. Particularly significant is how the traditional Republican and independent voters are going to react to the antics of their representatives who have a roadmap to crash the economy. This in the light of the benefits that Biden has bestowed upon them.

For those who believe that the Democrats can only be united in opposition they need to reflect on the fact that Pelosi pushed through Biden’s monumental agenda with a four vote majority 

The New Democratic Party House Leader Hakkim Jeffries is inspirational as witnessed by his performance and demeanor while the “GOP” three ring circus performed.