Our Political Swamp Keeps Getting Swampier

The Republican war against Trump since 2015 has taken a tremendous toll on the GOP. Clearly the party has had serious problems for decades. Granted, those problems reflect in large part the cultural problems facing America. Societal cultural standards but also civic culture—support for constitutional order—no longer command general consent and are even under determined attack in ways that fail to define any goal beyond the exercise of raw power. The war on Trump—motivated in large part by the concern to maintain America’s imperial imperatives abroad—has occurred at a time when the world order is changing as dramatically as our societal and political culture appears to be failing. To give Trump his due, much of his appeal in 2016 rested on the perception that he would seek to restore America to a cooperative role on the world stage, eschewing the bellicose foreign policy that has prevailed since the Clinton years. Trump’s policy of restoration entailed a turn toward strengthening our faltering constitutional order. The results were actually impressive when you take into account the determined Uniparty and Deep State efforts to sabotage his presidency, beginning well before Trump took office. The Zhou regime has seen an almost complete Neocon/Globalist takeover of our governing structures (excepting the SCOTUS) and a devotion to warfare and military confrontation around the world on three fronts (Russia, China, the Middle East) that has witnessed US military power being exposed as inadequate to our global imperial pretensions as well as being attritted at a pace that has our feckless military establishment alarmed. Nevertheless, the money backing the Neocon war policy continues to prevail in DC, as the divided Republicans self destruct.

Let’s take a look at where things stand currently. The Republican war on Trump—led by Bluto Barr, Turtle McConnell, and other party elders—entailed giving away leverage in Congresss, by allowing massive vote fraud to go largely unchallenged. The SCOTUS, judging itself to be the wrong institution to right the political order after the fact, refused to act on the results. Thus we have had almost a basically evenly divided Legislative Branch, with Establishment forces on both sides seeking to maintain a previous status quo—for the Dems, enforcing a prog social agenda while pushing for war everywhere around the world, for the GOPers, maintaining the country club anti-Trump ethos against the populist movement. The GOP has also maintained an extreme bellicose attitude. All of this fueled by vast sums of money from sources that are largely hostile to the American constitutional order—hostile to republican ideals of citizenship, devotion to oppressive top down governance at home and war abroad.

Where do conservatives—of various stripes—stand in this? The first inflection point occurred with the vacation of the Kevin McCarthy speakership, led by Matt Gaetz and a small group of conservatives. This was a move occasioned by McCarthy’s betrayal of his deal with the Freedom Caucus—which has a great deal of leverage, despite its relatively small numbers, due to the almost even partisan divide in the House.

The Johnson speakership has seen matters go from bad to worse, as Johnson has pushed the Democrat war agenda to help Zhou past the November election, while stiffing Republicans demanding action on the border crisis. Johnson has taken measures that go far beyond anything McCarthy did, including basically turning over his speakership to Dem Hakeem Jefferies to bring the vote on the war measures to the floor over majority Republican opposition.

This is where matters get really tangled. MTG filed a motion to vacate Johnson, which has now been seconded by Thomas Massie (a libertarian stalwart). This move has sparked controversy. The likes of Sundance and Tom Luongo insist that MTG and Massie are using the motion to vacate as part of a plot to turn control of the House over to the Dems and to deny Trump the presidency. They hint darkly at sexual scandals.

On the other hand, yesterday I presented the views of anti-war lefty Michael Tracey. Tracey argues cogently that Trump backed Johnson in all this—although MTG steadfastly refuses to acknowledge Trump’s role. I believe Tracey is correct in this, and that Trump sees support for inhuman wars—albeit discrete support—as part of his path to the presidency. In effect, he wants the money support that brings, while believing he can beat Zhou on other issues. Presumably he regards the debacle of the Republican party as a problem for later.

Where is Matt Gaetz—hero of the McCarthy vacation—in all this? According to Luongo, Gaetz is once again the hero for opposing the plotting of MTG and Massie. Tracey sees Gaetz as unprincipled for going along with the war party. Here is Gaetz explaining his actions—why he vacated McCarthy but won’t act against Johnson:

Would a Motion to Vacate Speaker Mike Johnson Result in a DEMOCRAT Speaker?!

Okay, so here's my perspective on the motion to vacate. When I filed the motion to vacate [McCarthy] I war gamed, strategized, about how a four- seat Republican majority would then reelect another [Republican] speaker, because it's not enough to have the votes to remove somebody--you have to actually replace them with somebody else, and I really took great care to promise this audience and the entire country that under no circstance would there be a Democrat Speaker of the House. I knew there might have been a few that maybe a little iffy would they vote for maybe a Josh Gottheimer style Democrat or a [David John] Trone style Democrat. But indeed I did not believe that the prisoners dilemma of a four- seat majority would allow five or six [Republicans] to be able to break off together [and vote for a Dem]. That wouldn't be available but here is what I regret to inform you. I do believe in a one-seat majority there could be one or two or three of my colleagues who would take a bribe in one form or another in order to deprive the Republicans of a majority. And let me tell you what a Democrat speaker looks like. Their lead off hitter will be declaring Donald Trp an insurrectionist and setting up a barrier to him being able to become the president of the United States if he is lawfully and legally elected, as I expect he will be. That'll be their lead off hitter, and then the chaser to that shot will be a massive spending package that looks a lot more like the American Rescue plan. They will blow past every concept of every cap ever imagined. You'll be looking at Universal Basic Income. You could be looking at packing the Supreme Court. And so the risk that one or two of my corrupt Republican colleagues might take a bribe, take a walk, feign an ailment, and flip this thing to the Democrats is a risk that is too high for me at this time.

So, he had it all figured out then, and he has it all figured out now. Clever boy! He doesn’t tell us who those corrupt Republicans are—we have to take his word. But there are problems with this narrative. Gaetz claims that his high wire act was perfectly safe back then when there was a four seat majority, but MTG’s high wire act is unsafe with a one seat majority. But. Wasn’t it foreseeable—certainly entirely possible—that that four seat majority would shrink over time due to: death, illness, personal reasons, political skullduggery? One could argue that the vacation of McCarthy thus left GOP conservatives hostage to Johnson. And, whaddaya know, Johnson has turned around and colluded with the Dems in ways that McCarthy never did. Who’s to say Johnson won’t do that again—or am I missing something here?

And then there’s the matter of the nameless but corrupt Republicans, that Gaetz brandishes. If there are such people out there they—and the other minority squish GOPers—will presumably vote with the new Johnson-Dem majority. Conservatives, nominally, are the clear minority and there’s no reason for the nonce for Dems to replace Johnson. That might come later when it becomes a matter of trying to disqualify Trump. For the time being, indeed, Dems will defend Johnson against Republican insurgents!

Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC), during an interview on MSNBC, suggested that he might be “inclined” to support Johnson if Greene and Company try to remove him as Speaker.

Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) defended Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) on Sunday, saying he “deserves to keep his job” as he faces down a threat to remove him after backing aid for Ukraine and Israel.

Clearly, at this point, Dems are looking to “face down” threats to Johnson’s New Speakership. How does that jibe with Gaetz’s narrative? Does that mean, a la Sundance and Luongo, that Dems Clyburn and Ro Khanna are defending Trump from the MTG/Massie plot? Hmmm.

But, pivoting back to Trump, there’s more to think about. A lot of readers will be familiar with the Tucker interview with Rogan, in which Tucker states that our elected Reps are scared sh*tless of the Deep State, lest the Deep State expose their weird sexual antics. This is how the Deep State runs the country. Hey, who am I to contradict an insider like Tucker? Maybe Johnson is one those weirdos. But there’s more in that interview, and I want to quote that part. Tucker has been talking about his revelations regarding Deep State complicity in the Kennedy assassination:

Joe Rogan Experience #2138 - Tucker Carlson

James Jesus Angleton, the head of the Operations Directorate [of the CIA] had knowledge [of the Kennedy assassination] ... that's the view of someone who saw the documents so I thought that was news. So I went on TV and said that. The next day, I'll never forget it, I went quail hunting and I was driving back and I got a phone call from Mike Pompeo's lawyer. Mike Pompeo was the Secretary of State [at the time of the phone call] but before then he was the director of the CIA, and in that position he plotted the murder of Julian Assange, so he is a criminal as far as I'm concerned. But his lawyer called me and said, 'You should know that anyone who tells you the contents of classified documents has committed a crime.' He's threatening me. ... I'll never forget this, and I said, 'Are you really saying that to reveal that the US government had a role in the murder of a democratically elected president, to say that out loud, that's a crime? What about the actual crime, which is murdering a president?' Like, you're covering up for that? He had no no response at all. And so Mike Pompeo is the one who pressed Trump to keep those documents secret [the Kennedy assassination docs] and so it's like, what's crazy to me is not just that Pompeo did that--I think Pompeo is a really sinister person and a criminal. I think that because the facts suggest that he was caught. Yahoo News, Mike Isikoff wrote a long piece on this several years ago. His employees went to Mike Isikoff and said, 'Hey, Mike Pompeo is plotting to murder Julian Assange, who has never even been charged with a crime in the United States!' As CIA director that's illegal. You're not allowed, federal employees are not allowed to just kill people they don't like, okay? Just to set the baseline here. So that's who Mike Pompeo is. But he somehow intimidated Trump into not releasing this. Well okay, that's all bad, right? I think it's criminal behavior. What's crazy is how Mike Pompeo is treated. He's treated as like a Republican poobah in good standing. He fully expects to become the secretary of defense in a Trump Administration--which is, like, completely insane! Why would you take a criminal and give him nuclear weapons? Okay, that's my view. I think it's a common sense view and, like, he goes to fundraisers and dinners and everyone's like, 'Hey, Mike Pompeo!’ It's like, you're the guy who kept information the public has a right to know secret, you're the guy who plotted the murder of someone who committed no crime, you are the outlaw, you are the bad guy! But, no, he's treated as like, you know, like a pillar of Republican Washington. I think it's mindbending to watch that.

Well, it is kinda mind bending, isn’t it? It speaks to our national crisis of culture. Before we close, let’s look at this long and thoughtful tweet that assesses Trump’s role in all this.

Arta Moeini @ArtaMoeini

Donald Trump used to boast that he could shoot people in the middle of Times Square & not lose his voters.

That was true for the most part, but the reason for it was that most saw him and his bravado as the embodiment of the anti-establishment energy they had silently craved since the 90s.

For 8 years, nothing Establishment media and politicians threw at him stuck, because this was coming from sources his supporters viewed as discredited and illegitimate. In fact, the attacks only added to his appeal.

I genuinely believe @realDonaldTrump has hugely miscalculated this time. By caving to the Establishment and the warmongering Lindsay Graham's of the world to send billions to foreign countries, he has showed himself to be a card-carrying member of the swamp rather than fighting it.

He has appeared weak and selling out on the two key issues that made him a real force: his 2016 stance against globalism & mass migration. The outrage I hear from the grassroot Right—especially the under 45s that (rightly or wrongly) saw him as a bulldozer against the old regime and its institutions—is really palpable and unprecedented.

I believe Trump's greatest gift was the intuitive way he understood his base and channeled their frustrations. He's a savvy politician; alarm bells must be going off in his head now. The Democrats & the Security State won doubly yesterday: 1) they got their billions for their globalist agenda without lifting a finger for the Border 2) They discredited Trump in the eyes of a good portion of his long-standing, loyal supporters who had stayed with him since 2016 and his war with the Bushes, thereby significantly diminishing his chances for returning to the White House.

I continue to believe Trump abhors war, seeing it as ugly and inexpedient, but his repeated backing of Mike Johnson to allow him to betray the trust of millions of conservatives could become a costly mistake. He has now made the error most politicians make when they go Establishment, trading the love of their base for nice headlines in CNN & the New York Times and ceasing to be the radical force for change that propelled them to power in the first place. For all their differences and mutual antipathy, this is something Trump shares with Obama.

If Trump loses in November, Historians will remember the betrayal of April 20th as the reason why.

3:02 PM · Apr 21, 2024