Here is something from FB, plus the conversation it engendered. It's about the possiblility of Trump resigning before his term is up. Sara is a certified futurist, so her opinion might carry a bit of extra weight. What do you think?
--Kim
I think the external pressure to resign will increase an order of magnitude after the election, for several reasons:
With a new Dem Congress coming in, donors will have extracted all they can out of him -- the next two years aren't going to be as lucrative as the other Trump years have been. So their financial incentive to keep paying Trump's freight won't be anything like it's been, either. Furthermore: Congressional corruption probes are going to have a lot of them heading for the boonies and lying low for the duration. Nobody with Trump ties is going to want to call attention to themselves once the House posses start to ride. His rich friends are already looking for other places to be.
Ambitious electeds at all levels, having gotten next to no support from Trump in this cycle, will owe him nothing. They're going to want the next two years to be Trump-free so they have a shot at rehabilitating the party's image by 2028. They can't salvage anything while he's still there. So they'll quietly push for him to go, too.
JD Vance might cooperate because his best shot at dominating in 2028 is by going in as an incumbent. (He's unpopular, but it would be very on-brand for him to hope that two years of forcing himself on America might give us time to learn to love him.) If he takes office after the new year, he'll be eligible for two more terms -- possibly 10 years total -- so there's another incentive to join the purge mob.
His rivals, like Marco, will cooperate because they all know that Trump will instinctively try to destroy anyone who attempts to succeed him. It's classic narcissistic collapse, and he won't be able to stop himself even if he realizes he's doing it. If he's still in office in 2028, ain't nobody in the GOP gonna survive the primary season. He'll make damn sure of it. If these hangers-on and dead-enders want any kind of shot at all in the future, they need to sink Trump before he gets a chance to sink them.
The stars of doom are lining up, and even the sycophants who've been propping Trump up for the past decade are starting to see it. The sooner the Orange Baboon gets gone, the better it'll be for all of them. He's finally outlived his political utility. It's time for him to go.
In my view the odds of Trump resigning have increased greatly. It might be his only viable option. It is his ace in the hole, his get out of jail free card. Trump can give Vance the presidency in exchange for a pardon. Whereas if Trump stays, with a Democrat Congress his life is going to be one big investigation. His corruption will come out, the Epstein files will see the light of day and much of his cabinet, and perhaps some of his Supreme Court will be impeached. Republicans could join in the retribution.
Republicans are turning against Trump, blaming him for the political collapse of their party. None of them running for Congress or anything else are mentioning Trump in their campaigns. Mary Miller, Illinois' MAGA White Witch of the South, speaks of "standing with JD Vance;" no mention of Trump. With Trump's approval at the lowest of any president in history, some Republicans will throw Trump under the bus to save themselves. Though it is probably too late.
With Republican acquiescence, Trump might thus be successfully impeached and subsequently prosecuted. Trump's State Department is feverishly trying to get the International Criminal Court dissolved. They might know something? Trump could get removed by impeachment and turned over to The Hague. It would save us the trauma and distraction of his prosecution. Everyone, including and especially Republicans, wants to forget Trump ever existed. On trial in The Hague, Trump would lose the ability to manipulate the protections of the US Constitution, which he trampled while in office. His corrupt Supreme Court would not be able to protect him. We could thus let the world deal with punishing Trump and his minions. We could get on with repairing our country and working on solving the many critical problems created by Trump and by decades of pseudo-conservatism turned fascist.
In my view, Trump is very likely to resign soon. If he did it before the election, it might reprieve Republicans to some extent. But he must go before January.
I don't think impeachment is the path. There are other ways to get him out -- 25A, donor pressure. But I think the most likely route is the Spiro Agnew diversion -- offering a pardon for all crimes in exchange for his resignation, backed up with the threat of immediate prosecution if the offer's refused.
He'll walk -- but his kids may not, and most of the people who abetted him won't, either. As Congress makes its investigative march through both his administrations, the evidence is going to pile up, to the point where voluntary exile to stay out of jail would be his only real option.
I'd really like to see the US recover the money he's grifted in our name, though.
Reply
Edited
Sara there's a big misunderstanding about how the 25th executes.
Sara Robinson The 25th doesn't apply if the President can sign his name. I don't know why people keep bringing it up. Alas, I guess because impeachment is too hard. The 25th is harder, much much harder, than impeachment.
Reply
I like letting the International court handle it.
The world has interest in see him stand trial.
Plus it let’s our legislators get back to work, and not jammed up investigating for two years.
Dems need to put a positive foot forward and fast.
Reply
I think this is an optimistic read of the situation. Trump has no intention of leaving office alive. If anything, Democrats getting some nominal power is going to lead him to becoming even more dangerous. The narcissistic injury will be intense and he will treat congress as an enemy.
Trump can't be removed without 2/3rds of the Senate. Pressure for him to resign will just force the narcissistic injury even more. Increasing levels of paranoia. Doubling down on surrounding himself with trusted sycophants.
Reply
Edited
Now that the geopolitical realignment is obvious it seems doubtful it will be this simple. As reassuring as it is to hope…
Reply
Makes sense. I’m gonna crunch on this all day now.
I wondered how the dynasty would crumble.
I even see Faux news is putting some distance on his actions.
Reply
While my skepticism remains high, I love this logic 
Reply
His ego is too inflated to resign, he really believes his own BS. I think he's already decided against dying peacefully in his sleep, so woo-hoo, here comes the show. 
Reply
Outstanding.
This makes perfect sense -- almost obvious.
Fingers crossed...
Reply
I don’t think that’s even going to be on the table. He’s a mental patient with dementia, and unless Congress takes action, he will sit right there and all the people who benefit from it will continue doing so until action takes place
Reply
Martin Bogomolni Congressional action is the key that changes everything. Much depends on how big the blowout is on 11/3, and how aggressive the Dems will be in pushing their advantage afterward. And also how brutal the beating the GOP takes is. If it's the shellacking we're expecting, they may be really eager to get him gone so they can move on.
Reply
Sara Robinson I'm betting on _interference_ in the election process, from the $B/$T crowd ... we have some really shitty things happening
Reply
I strongly oppose pardoning him for war crimes. He won’t be prosecuted for them, of course, but it’s an extremely bad precedent to include those in the pardon roster and it should loudly and repeatedly noted when the pardon is discussed.
Reply
Timothy Lange I agree -- but it may be the only justice we get. And it's not a pardon (I don't think Agnew got a pardon, either); it's a frank quid pro quo: go quietly, and we won't prosecute. Or stick around, and take your chances. As the walls close in, Door #1 is going to look increasingly attractive.
The beauty part of this is that if he takes that deal and doesn't go away, the charges can always come back, as long as the statute of limitations hasn't expired. Also: this kind of agreement, if made by Congress, wouldn't be binding on either state courts or the ICC.
Reply
He will never voluntarily give up control—-or grifting opportunities.
Reply
Christine Charbonneau True. But it may be possible to engineer a situation where he doesn't have a choice. The Agnew option -- resign now, avoid prosecution, die in your own bed versus stay put and face a perp walk and a lifetime in prison -- may be within reach once Congressional investigations get rolling.
Also: I think we're discounting just how much Congressional Republicans are likely to abandon him after the election. He's done squat for them, and their odds in 2028 are even worse if they let him stay. 55 Dem Senate seats may put impeachment within reach. We'd only need 12 Republicans who can read the writing on the wall.
Reply
Trump should be impeached again. He will not resign...
Reply
Copied and pasted. Thanks for the excellent post Sara.
Reply
What do you think about the conservatives blocking the new congress? Johnson will simply refuse to seat them, as he did with Grijalva (that was a dress rehearsal, I think), and they will contest the results of every single race they lose, delaying the seating indefinitely.
Reply
I really, really hope you're right, although the idea of letting him off for all of his crimes is a horror.
Reply
I disagree - I think his dashed narcissistic desire for supplication to him, which he considers "love." will cause him to do ever uglier things. He has threatened violence for over a decade, and allowed people to die in response to his frustration - 750,000+ thanks to COVID and 1.5 million a year in the Global South when he killed USAID. If it has to be disloyal/exhausted/non-benefitting-from-grifting Republicans that have to be dominated and eliminated first, to his mind, so be it.
Reply
·
Lovely idea, but I don't see him going anywhere.
Reply
F
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment