I wrote Volume 1 of this series less than six weeks into the Trump administration. I was planning to write them roughly every three months. The main purpose of these posts was to be tracking predictions I made the night Donald Trump was elected. I have neglected writing them in part because while Donald Trump has a rare gift for making controversy, none of the events of the past ten months seemed to clearly delineate the end of the beginning of this presidential term. Then yesterday happened. Paul Manafort and Rick Gates were indicted and we learned that George Papadopoulos had plead guilty to lying to the FBI about meetings between the Trump campaign and the Russians.
It is no longer possible for Trump world to say with a straight face that there is no evidence of collusion. There was collusion. It remains to be seen how significant that collusion in breadth and scope, but it happened. And now Trump must govern under the credible shadow of Bob Mueller for the foreseeable future.
I. New Business: The first 284 days of President Trump.
The bad news is that Donald Trump is bad at being president. The good news is that Donald Trump is bad at being president. The bad part is that almost a year into the job, he continues to embarrass his country and cheapen his office every time he speaks. He fucked up a condolence call to a war widow. He danced with a sword in Saudi Arabia. He welshed on a promise to pay $25,000 to a gold star dad, until the media shamed him int doing it. He referred to the governor of the Virgin Island as their president. He started a needless fight with NFL players and an ESPN broadcaster. He is, in short, a feckless idiot.
And this stupidity manifests itself, more substantively in an inability to get much done in congress. He has failed to repeal Obamacare. His tax reform ideas are laughably shallow and languishing before a tepid congress. He hasn't passed anything difficult or meaningful, despite having control of both houses.
Which is not to say that he has not done damage. His cabinet appointments have almost without exception proven to be inept. His secretary of state called him a fucking moron, while also compiling a reputation for his own incompetence as the head of our most important department of government. His ambassador to the United Nations seems hell bent on scuttling the Iran deal, which would mean that we would go back to having nuclear crises with 2/3 of the Axis of Evil. Ben Carson can not be bothered to learn what his job is and we all have to wonder how Rick Perry's doing at learning what nuclear energy is.
And then there's his own White House staff. Bannon and Priebus were both fired so the reigns could be turned over to John Kelly, whom the president insists on referring to as General Kelly. Just 30 days ago it was still fashionable to think that Kelly was going to save us form this mess. Since that time he has been trotted out to defend Trump for offending the widow of Sgt. Johnson during the condolence call. While doing so he smeared a member of congress. The falsity of his statements about her were established by video tape within hours. A week later, he still refuses to apologize for his inaccurate statement. Oh and he chalked up the Civil War to a "failure to compromise". It was unclear at press time how Mr. Kelly proposed the slaves should have compromised their way out of bondage.
The strongest impression that I get of Donald Trump is that he is a very lonely man. He is obsessed with television and reportedly watches Fox News for hours at a time. He often tweets what Fox & Friends covers in the morning. At night he sometimes complains about television reporters and editorial boards. Now he has indictments to worry about. I still think it's unlikely that the Russia scandal ends with him in handcuffs or even being removed from office. But I see dark days ahead, because this lonely old man worries about things like that. And worst of all, he knows exactly what he is guilty of. That can't be comforting.
II. Old Business: The State of My Predictions About Trump.
1. "The Iran Deal will be torn up."
Well, probably. He has taken the first steps towards this but his inner circle seem unwilling to blatantly lie about the fact that Iran is complying with their end of the deal. As it stands, I believe he will back out of the deal. Which means that our sanctions will go back in place but the European Union and Russia and China will not sanction Tehran at all. So Iran will be free to pursue nuclear weapons, and do business with the rest of the world. America would gain the theoretical ability to conduct military operations against Iran, which would result in a calamity roughly three times as big as what Iraq has been for the past 14 years. Let's hope that Mattis and Tillerson continue to delay their boss from being completely reckless on this front.
2. "Antonin Scalia will be replaced by a conservative rather than Merrick Garland."
Check. And there are some real signs that Neil Gorsuch will be worse than Scalia on substance and form. He is perhaps second only to Kelly in giving up the ghost about being a moderating influence on our politics.
3. "ISIS has a new propaganda talking point."
Well, yeah, that's true. But to be fair to the president, ISIS has lost a lot of territory this year. In normal times that would be a big story. But no one is paying attention to that because Trump keeps making side shows here at home. And because no one really thinks that the destruction of Islamic State will be the end of what westerners really care about: large acts of terror committed in Europe and North America.
4. "It is now the official policy of the United States government that Climate Change is a hoax perpetrated by China to disrupt American manufacturing. "
Still true.
5. "At some point next year the Congress will repeal Obamacare."
I'm very glad to be wrong so far about this one. The next trick will be to convince Trump that it's good for his reputation to save Obamacare by fully funding the exchanges and the advertising for Obamacare plans. The hardcore Trumpers like Bannon and Miller will hate that, but it might be something he could be Rumplestilkin'd into doing.
6. "At some point next year the Congress will pass massive tax cuts and the overwhelming majority of these cuts will benefit very wealthy people.:
This is a coin toss now. Paul Ryan seems to be a dead-ender on this one and I think that a tax bill will get out of the house. But I'm not sure the Senate will be able to pass anything along the lines of what is being proposed. Trump needs this bill but he's spending his very limited political capital on Twitter feuds. Frankly if the Republicans don't bass tax cuts, I don't know what their game is even about.
7. "Immigration policy is about to become a lot less thoughtful."
This was the safest prediction I made, but even I didn't think they would be detaining 10 year old girls with cerebreal palsy.
8. "There will be a bunch of dumb protectionist policies put in place. "
Well he did withdraw from TPP, and he's always prattling on about trade deficits. But it seems this issue was more symbolic than anything. The biggest thing to watch for on this front next year is NAFTA. Trump would be wise to get some marginal changes to the deal and claim that it's a huge, tremendous win for American factories. But if things go bad for him elsewhere, he might decide to blow the whole thing up. And that will hurt the whole world.
9. "The implements of the federal government will be used to settle the president's political scores. "
Every damn day.
10. "The new school of political science thought will be personality based."
Meh. Sure.
III. New Business: What to Look For.
It is easy to fulminate on the spectacle that is Donald J. Trump living in the White House and flying on Air Force One and being saluted by colonels and green berets. The ludicrous nature of these visuals is captivating. The damage this spectacular narcissist will do is going to be hard to measure. But there are at least some signs that institutions are holding the line, as best they can. Yesterday's news was the best sign of that yet. I do think the next nine months will be worse than the previous nine. But maybe, just maybe, the senate and the courts and the man's own incompetence will make things less terrible than I feared they would be 51 weeks ago when this horrible man triple bank shot his way into 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
But if there is one thing to look for between now and the next time I get around to chronicling this b-list gangster movie of a government, it is this: the way that right-wing news outlets kowtow to their leader. The Wall Street Journal editorial board yesterday proposed this modest solution: Trump should pardon everyone in his inner circle, including himself, of any and all crimes related to Russia, and then resume governing. Maybe this is just the Wall Street Journal's fever dream about tax reform not passing. But someone in that room should have said "Guys, you've just disavowed the rule of law. Do that and we can never be taken seriously again."
But no one said that and no one will say it on Fox or Breitbart, etc. But those people need in the #MAGAsphere on Twitter and every asshole uncle around the Thanksgiving dinner table in a few weeks needs to hear the truth: we are nothing without the rule of law. And it's the job of citizens to tell them. Every chance you get.
