Category: POLITICS

On February 24th, 1868, after three years of open conflict with a President of the United States they universally detested, the House of Representatives of the United States passed 11 articles of Impeachment against President Andrew Johnson. The accidental President Johnson, brought to the position of the Presidency through the tragic assassination of President Lincoln, was from the first day of his oath a mistake the victorious Republican radicals of congress hoped to cleanse. Lincoln had determined at a difficult time in his reelection bid to remove the competent Hannibal Hamlin of Maine as his running mate in 1864, and replace him with Johnson, the Governor of Tennessee who was a pro Union Democrat. Lincoln, always the strategic thinker, sought to invigorate the necessary unifying forces that would help bring the nation somehow together after the bloody conflict of the Civil War. He saw the new Vice President as symbolic of the steps needed to begin binding the nation’s wounds, not remotely as a substitute for himself in the treacherous post war world that ultimately would come. The assassin Boothe would decide differently.

By 1868, Johnson and the Republican Congress were so at odds that both sought to bend the Constitution to subvert the other. Radical Republicans in Congress passed Amendments to the Constitution that would forever end slavery and provide all men with voting rights. Johnson, a Southerner and strict States Rights advocate, saw such laws as unjust with the southern states yet to be formerly represented in the post war congress. He vetoed their actions, and Congress overrode his veto. These laws, like all laws, required executive cooperation in their actualization, and Secretary of War Stanton, a Lincoln holdover and Radical Republican, took Congress’s direction over the President’s. The Congress, to prevent Johnson from removing Stanton, passed the Tenure In Office Law that demanded Congress would have last say on removal of Cabinet Ministers, a highly dubious extra-constitutional act. Johnson waited until Congress was in recess, and removed Stanton, and all hell broke loose.

For the first time, the mechanism of checks and balances put in place by the framers of the Constitution came into stark relief, as one branch, the legislative, determined to remove the Chief Executive of another branch.

The House of Representatives … shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.

— Article I, Section 2, Clause 5
The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments. When sitting for that Purpose, they shall be on Oath or Affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside: And no Person shall be convicted without the Concurrence of two-thirds of the Members present.

Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States; but the Party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law.

—Article II, Section 2
The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.

—Article II, Section 4

The 11 articles of Impeachment passed by the House of Representatives against President Johnson included two that referred to the House’s disdain for the rough language the President was renowned for using. The other nine referred to Johnson’s determination to remove Stanton, which very likely was his Constitutional prerogative. The key to the first effort to impeach a President of the United States foundered on the rocks of the vagaries expressed in Article II, Section 4 – what exactly are High Crimes and Misdemeanors?

As bad as Congress detested Johnson, many recognized the action of removal was an extreme act for overturning an election, and on May 16,1868, the initial article was voted upon, and fell one vote short of the two thirds necessary to acquit, including 10 of the 45 Republicans voting with the minority Democrats. A ten day recess was requested in hopes of swaying at least one more vote. Rumors of bribes offered to the nay sayers were rife, but to no avail. All three votes taken were 35-19, and President Johnson kept his job.

Later years have brought at least two close calls. President Nixon resigned in August of 1973 before imminent articles of impeachment were voted upon by the House, and in 1998 William Clinton was impeached but easily survived the Senate trial falling a full 17 votes short of the article intimating Obstruction of Justice.

At the heart of each prior impeachment, there has been the intimation of a suspected crime, failure to uphold the laws of the United States by Johnson, a coverup of crimes by Nixon, and Perjury by Clinton.

And that brings us to 2020, where we find ourselves in another impeachment process again brought by an opposition House that detests the President, and dumped into a Senate that wants little to do with the political hit job . Particularly galling with this attempt – the absence of any premised much less actual crime. The House flipped to Democrat leadership in 2018, and has been on a mission to “dump Trump” for the temerity of having beaten Hillary Clinton in 2016 and sticking his thumb in the Obama legacy ever since.

The first attempt at emasculation was the two year Mueller investigation to try to connect Trump somehow to the election result through “Russian collusion”. As the facts arrived, the dirt seemed to fall dramatically more upon the attacking Democrats, with the faint stench of a possible internal “coup” attempt laced with grossly inappropriate spying and warrants around the naive Trump team entirely based upon clumsy and dirty opposition research paid for and provided by the opposition Clinton team. When that fell through, the party immediately latched upon a so called “whistleblower” , using that designation for given credence to bringing forward a private interaction between the President and a foreign leader. As with the previous attempt the dirt attached to the Ukraine story appears to have even more to say regarding Democrat actions than Trumpian misdeeds. When all is said and done, the evidence of accepting bribes, paid for influence, and corrupt action may well end Democrat candidate for President Joe Biden’s career rather than Trump.

But first, the circus must go on. Impeachment, designed by the founders as a particularly rare and necessarily nonpartisan identification of dramatic malfeasance requiring the upset of the balance powers through a mechanism other than election, has once again fallen far short of the mark. Two articles proffered by the House of Representatives , neither defining a crime, a treason or a bribe, have been submitted for the single intent to sufficiently damage Trump to prevent his re-election. Once again, the disqualification falls more upon those who would attempt to disqualify. For all his personality flaws, Donald John Trump has led an unprecedented expansion of the economy, obliteration of unemployment, restoration of some trade balance, dramatic reduction in regulations, securing of the country’s border, and restoration of the concept of deference in a dangerous world.

Hating his guts will prove to be a lousy logic for impeachment, and an even lousier one for defeating him in an election. As Lyman Trumball of Illinois, one of the Republican Senators who voted for the acquittal of President Johnson sagely reflected, the freedom to disagree with Congress has to be upheld if checks and balances of the Constitution are to be maintained. For self righteous people stoked with irrational anger, blowing up the Constitution seems to be a necessary sacrifice to make them feel vindicated. The lesson Trump is about to deliver is going to be a particularly nasty wakeup call indeed.

When President Obama assumed the Presidency of the United States in 2009, he ushered in changes that reflected his desire to, as he stated it, to totally transform the United States. The decorum of the Oval Office in the White House was converted to reflect this change, including a carpet bordered with deep quotations that would orient the philosophy of the new administration, devoted as it was to a social justice revolution. The new President was particularly fond of one of the carpet quotations he had selected that he attributed to Martin Luther King, Jr:

The arc of the moral Universe is long , but it bends toward Justice

Unfortunately like so many other things in the Obama Administration, the surface veneer did not reflect real life facts. It turns out that the author of the quote was not Dr. King, as Obama had convinced himself, but rather , an abolitionist Unitarian minister, Theodore Parker, who proffered the remark in a collection of sermons in 1853.

Oh well, the point was that eventually justice wins out. An errant fact was not going to upset the narrative of the administration, which was, as the press insisted on telling us – scandal free – in its drive to transform us. Well maybe that wasn’t quite true either. It may well turn out that the Obama Administration, particularly through its national security and justice arms, determined to achieve the ultimate in scandalous behavior, the undermining of a political opponent, Trump, prevent his electoral victory, and when not successful in that, engage a sustained effort to weaken and destroy his Presidency. The famous e-mail by FBI agent Peter Stroch to his lover FBI lawyer Lisa Page referencing the presence of an “insurance policy” just in case Trump somehow achieved election, becomes more clear this past weekend as the Inspector General of the Justice Department, Michael Horowitz released his report on the interactions of FBI Director James Comey and then President elect Trump, and beyond, in the first few months of the nascent new Presidency. Contrary to Comey’s comment to Trump that he personally was not under investigation for any suspected collusion with Russian involvement in the election, The IG found Comey’s actions in obtaining, recording, and disseminating memos regarding his interactions with Trump squarely put Trump at the center of an ongoing investigation designed to entrap him, and lay the seeds for criminal inditement or impeachment. James Comey wasn’t attempting to serve the new president. He was attempting to get rid of him.

As Andy McCarthy, a former prosecutor who has intensely followed the process since the beginning , states, it is clear now that the fix was in, and Obama Administration officials were working to “short circuit ” the Trump Presidency. Unlike Obama’s errant misquote, this would be really, really bad if true, and as the wheels come off the Trump collusion narrative, it is looking more and more true. We may be looking at one of the worst scandals in the history of America democracy – the “insurance policy” designed to achieve a coup.

The first deep dive by the IG towards malfeasance focuses upon a Director of the once sacrosanct Federal Bureau of Investigation, James Comey. Comey, a politico director with an extreme level of self satisfied behavior, first worked his magic to bury a devastating security breach that involved Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the destruction of thousands of secure government emails that were likely exposed through her malfeasance to hostile foreign powers. Having determined on his own to function as prosecutor and jury (likely with guidance from his superiors), he pre-emptively determined to find her untoward actions to be below the threshold requiring prosecution. Now comes the IG’s ire for Comey’s deliberate effort to somehow link a Presidential candidate to a Russian spy network that had managed to inject through a former British spy, a dossier of scurrilous stories, paid for by Trump’s opponent Clinton in their effort to obtain “opposition research”, then pan it off as fact with the rest of the Obama national security apparatus through three grand juries of the FISA court, allowing phone taps and other counter intelligence actions against of Trump, and drive an investigation that would lead to a special prosecutor who spent more than two years hampering and pressuring the new President attempting to get him to crack. Turns out the ‘scandal free’ administration may have attempted the ultimate scandal, a coup. Comey was actively participating as the tip of the spear.

The sad fact is that the President’s pugnacious nature and looseness with the language of facts played directing into the hands of coup leaders and their full blown accomplices, the elite media. For two years, the media pounded Trump like a piñata, buying in to the fallacious narrative, and brutally driving it every day in their own obscene effort to get rid of Trump.

https://youtu.be/xwW9RZCEydw

Only a bull dog like Trump could have survived the onslaught. The larger question is whether our constitutional democracy can survive the onslaught to our bedrock principles of a free, unencumbered, disinterested press and civil service that believes in democratic institutions and rule of law. The last several decades, and particularly the last several years show the narrative wants to demolish our precious, hard won constitutional protections against such onslaughts.

Well, maybe as Dr. King said, or more correctly as Dr. King paraphrased what Minister Parker said, the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice. Hopefully as more light falls on the subject of this treacherous episode in our nation’s story, the bend for all the willing culprits, will be towards real justice. We will see what our decaying institutions do with all the sunshine, as the culprits begin to scatter.

 

On November 9th, 2016. the citizens of United States of America awoke to the uncomfortable reality that a brazen, brash real estate mogul from New York managed one of the most unlikely and inconceivable victories in the history of American politics — and it wasn’t even that close.  To the amazement of most voters, Donald Trump had defeated Hillary Clinton by convincing a thin sliver of the upper Midwest to abandon their traditional voting pattern and take a chance on a complete novice  over the supposed ‘most prepared’ candidate in history.  The great majority of the public had a wary, wait and see attitude about the unknown quantity that was Donald Trump.  An elite cadre, including, it appears, the outgoing administration, had a much more targeted impression in mind.  From almost the first day after the election, whispers of “foreign influence” in the election began and the suggestion was the unreal outcome may have tainted.  The result was a rapidly progressive narrative that the win was dirty, and had been achieved by means beyond the ballot box.  The idea that a clownish Trump with no political experience could have convinced a nation on his own that the country’s direction of the last twenty-five years, and particularly the last eight, needed a shocking redirection, was too much for the elite establishment.  There had to be another, far more nefarious answer — collusion with the arch enemy Putin.

So began the public assault on the Trump Presidency from his first day in office.  The private assault began much earlier it turns out.  Mechanisms to assure that in the unlikely scenario of a Trump victory the Trump presidency would be cornered and starved for oxygen day one were put in place.  The assumption likely was that the excruciating pressure would cause the novice to explode and flame out by taking some extra-constitutional action that would allow for a legal overturning of the electoral outcome through an impeachment process.  The number of people that coordinated to position the embryonic Trump administration for demolition was impressive and may not yet be fully exposed. 

The key to the process would be Trump’s incendiary personality, because everyone intimate to the assault had to know the evidence that would be used was at most flimsy, and to a large part concocted and paid for by the very political campaign Trump had managed to defeat.  No matter, because such day to day pressure upon such a thin skinned individual would no doubt expose other vulnerabilities and make the original far fetched connections immaterial.  The early indications must have enhanced the confidence of the conspirators.  The appointment of a special prosecutor by Trump’s own Justice Department, the firing of the FBI Director, the enthusiastic assumption of the narrative by the mainstream media.  Perhaps the fatal conceit was the judgment of the character of the President himself, the thin skin proving to be downright reptilian, and the bombastic comebacks covering a relatively nuanced and careful avoidance of impulsive actions by the reputed King of Impulse.

Two years, millions of dollars, and to the chagrin and horror of the elites, the Scorpion King stands above the chaos.  Now, the questions may begin to swirl as to whether Trump has simply survived a legal investigation, or possibly was the victim of one of the more dark political operations in the history of the constitutional republic.  Did the previous administration determine to scuttle the next President?  Was the opposition campaign involved? Is a fantastical image of a Deep State immune to the decisions of the electorate and determined to function athwart the democracy a reality?

Watergate will always be held up as the most significant attack on the constitutional republic, but was in essence, the clumsy and illiberal efforts of a politician to wall himself off from being associated with his contributions to the dirty pool of American politics.  This political scandal, that may have been a direct attempt to take down an American President by his own executive branch, may end up much closer to shaking the foundations of American government, if all the scabs are fully exposed.  Will the national press that relished the opportunity to expose the first scandal determine, as the facts come out regarding who really were the colluding collaborators,  engage to reveal, or bury, the second?

Whatever you may think of Trump, and God knows I’ve thought it all, he may, unbelievably, prove to be on the right side of history.  His unparalleled ability to withstand and overcome those that sought to overturn a national electoral decision, may have made this most unlikely of constitutional patriots,  the indispensable person for our troubled times.

 

 

An original 1951 economic compact developing a proposed improved internal post war trade zone between the former allies France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg, and their erstwhile enemies, Italy and West Germany, was seized by idealists and over the decades grew into something altogether more imposing.  By 1993, the dream of a continental free market was realized in the Treaty of Maastricht, forming  the birth of a democracy inspired concept of a shared European destiny and citizenry, the European Union, and now  comprises 28 member states and over 500 million people.  The United Kingdom, twice thrown into vicious continental wars, was a wary but foundational participant in the European experiment.  Conceived as a means of economic linkage that would effectively bind the European nations in such a fashion that the horrendous rivalries that caused a previous century and a half of bloody conflict would have no oxygen for existence, the European Union has instead metastasized progressively into a somewhat autocratic political bureaucracy answerable to no one.  The British, never comfortable with the most identifiable element of loss of sovereignty, the Euro currency, chafed at the other elements of loss of control of decisions they feel befitted a free people.

On June 23, 2016, the people of the United Kingdom shocked the world.  A referendum that asked the basic question of modern times only a democracy could risk answering – should a modern society maintain a cozy, passive, somewhat indentured but secured life , or risk an uncertain but independent self determined future  – was resoundingly answered in the direction of freedom.   Brexit, the act of leaving the political and economic responsibilities associated with being a signee of the Treaty of the European Union, was voted  in the affirmative by over 52% of the United Kingdom.  The stunning outcome has had enormous reverberations through the British political establishment ever since.  Prime Minister Cameron, who campaigned on the need for Britain to Remain, held an untenable position with the loss and resigned.  The foremost Leave supporters in the cabinet, Boris Johnson and Michael Gove, ended up shooting each other in the proverbial foot, and were out-organized and outgunned by Theresa May.   May, every bit the Remainer as was most of the British Cabinet and elites, implied that with her new position as leader of the elected representatives of the United Kingdom, she had had an epiphany with the vote, and emoted that “Brexit means Brexit”.

On March 29, 2017, Article 50 of the European Union Treaty was evoked, and the two year negotiating period to formally exit the union was initiated.    A deadline of March 29, 2019 was felt more than enough time to establish the rules of a divorce.     

If you had bet, however,  upon an organized enlightened process from the elected British government representing the interests of the British people who voted so strongly for independence, you have lost badly.  Prime Minister May has shown the political dexterity of a wildebeest and the stubborn grip of a python on progressively weaker negotiated stances.    First, wildly overestimating her personal connection with the people, a flash election in 2017 meant to extend her significant House of Commons majority instead ended with a humiliating Conservative Party retrenchment.  The radical Labor Party markedly strengthened its hand , and May was forced into a political marriage with a minority  Northern Ireland Unionist Party, just to maintain her position as Prime Minister.  Misreading the loss, May lurched into a Remainer Lite philosophy, alienating the passionate Leave base of her own party, and seeing a never ending cascade of Cabinet Ministers resigning in disgust over the inability to formulate any semblance of an aggressive, independence driven negotiation with the European Union bureaucracy.  Last week, May, after affirming in speeches time and time again, a series of “red lines” an independent Britain could not abide in any post Brexit relationship,  produced her long awaited Magnum Opus agreement for a potential House of Commons vote-which proved to be laced with red line surrenders, leading to a whole new group of resignations.

With less than four months to go to the Brexit conclusion date of March 29th, 2019, the apparent best agreement May could negotiate positions Great Britain to maintain subservience to the EU Courts, trade restrictions as required by the EU Custom Union, dependence upon EU immigration rules, billions in payments to the EU – and no residual say in EU parliament where the rules are formed.  A Brexit much worse than no Brexit.   If you think that’s the sound of independence and self determination, you are reading the wrong blog.

Needless to say, as with most modern governments, the elected elite have always assumed that the people who elect them, need to be led, not represented.   Prime Minister May and the phalanx of government bureaucrats that had no intention to ever separate from their fellow continental bureaucrats,  always hoped for a strategy of delay until the populist’s  passion to leave would wane, and the better minds would prevail.  Now, she is attempting to look stalwart, clinging with a two fisted death grip on a loser, knowing that the impending March date arriving without any kind of agreement , looks like a disastrous cliff to most.  

Great leaders in history have frequently been required to defend unpopular positions, but the great ones have had an innate sense of the people’s will.  Theresa May has managed to have an almost surreal genetic absence of instinct for historical trajectory, and could find herself without a political friend in the world.  The European Union negotiators have relied on her lack of commitment to Brexit, the Labor Party is standing by to watch her flop, the Conservatives realize the people will reject them for having bungled completely the Brexit process, her supporters will look for a way back in to the EU, and May will get to join the commanding political heights achieved by only the most profoundly ineffectual.

The sad commentary is that democracies have really forgotten how to do the tough things, the things that rely on a sense of confidence and destiny inspired by their past contributors.  When you believe in yourself and the unique qualities that led to past success, to your liberties and free will, the future does not hold a right path or a wrong path, only your own path.  Theresa May like all modernist politicians has a fear of failing, and will therefore never look to succeed. 

Great Britain, in voting for Brexit, was asking for a return to the self determination and freedom that had defined its history, and will find this particular group of British leaders wanting nothing of the sort.  Winston Churchill once famously stated about the British people , “Give us the tools, and we will finish the job”.  Soon we will see if the country has enough gumption to take back the rudder, stabilize the ship of state at this critical time ,  and find the people who can get the job done.

November 6th, 2018 brings that time honored tradition in the United States – the biennial national election day.  Ramparts has had its own election tradition – of generally doing a poor job of predicting results – maybe just a little too much leaning on hoped for outcomes, and not enough objective recognition of the fickle nature of the American electorate.  This is a country that uniformly blames the side they just elected, and looks to throw the bums out.  Ramparts doesn’t show  prejudice as a  wrong headed prognosticator – picking Romney over Obama, Clinton over Trump, and missing the 2010 backlash entirely.  Then again, significantly more qualified observers and pollsters managed to blow those calls as well, particularly the herculean Trump upset.  The 2018 battle has been at various times promoted as a blue wave,  a disastrous Senate map for Democrats full of Trump states, and High Noon for the Resistance.  The so called off year election, where absent a  Presidential candidate at the head of the ticket, has in the past been assumed to focus more on local factors. The ubiquitous nature of social media and reams of money aligned with the ever increasing polarization of views has, however,  made even local dog catcher elections ‘pivotal’.  No, really. Pivotal.   Pandering, buying influence and votes, denigrating an opponent, describing an opposition triumph as Armageddon for the country – well, that’s what we would call the American Way.  And don’t you know , millions are going to go to that voting booth and proudly do their part, to celebrate the process one more time. I will be one of them.

If there is no earthshaking prediction based on inside information I am able to offer to either assure you or appall you based on the outcome, at least a few  observations are in order.

The House of Representatives – A Lighter Shade of Blue:      The 2010 election was epical for Republicans.  Feasting off  disillusionment with the creaky health care shenanigans of the Obama administration, a massive wave of contrarians were voted to both state house legislatures and governorships, the effects of which are still mightily felt today.  Put in position to interpret the 2010 Census, these legislatures re-configured the electoral map and republicans have held a natural advantage at both the state and national legislature level since.  Recognizing the impenetrable coalitions of urban suburbs and inner city democratic machines that keep the voting loyalty of even the dear departed, republican legislatures let the cities have their wins, and carved out their own districts of winnable voters.  this has led to an 8 year dynasty of a republican led house, and has infuriated democrats who see the people’s house as theirs by eminent domain.  A flurry of lawsuits by democrats to overturn the districting maps has begun to bite, mostly prominently in Pennsylvania, where the state’s liberal Supreme Court overturned the map and likely overturned 5 republican districts into the democrat column.  This is a terrific head start in a world where a switch of 24 seats would lead to a Democrat majority and a return to a Pelosi run circus.  The traditional trend of the next election after a Presidential election is for the President’s party to lose significant seats in Congress – in keeping with the American tradition of never give carte blanche to any party.   The Trump phenomena however is the most unpollable electorate of modern political polling and all bets are off picking the outcome.  A democrat win of the House means Speaker Pelosi and Committee Chairmen Nadler, Waters, and Clyburn.  Let the circus commence!  True, juicy justice in outcome would be a Democrat pick up of 22 seats, so close to victory, yet  frustratingly just short of power, pulling the hypocrisy wool off everyone’s eyes for good, as the self destructive liberal wing would devourer what little carcass of what was left of any discerning progressives that still believed in their country,  More likely? A painful two years of nonstop Trump badgering, bashing and hectoring if they win, and two years of nothing ever getting done.

The Senate – Where has All The Money Gone?:    Since the 17th Amendment to the Constitution was passed in 1913, the election of Senators have been by the direct vote of the people.  Given that each state staggers its Senate elections, the Senate races tend to have very intense individual focus on the candidates, and as such, have elevated the job to national prominence and influence.  And we are talking serious influence.  Take for instance the Texas Senate race between Ted Cruz the incumbent Senator and his challenger Beto O’Rourke.  Apparently the job of a Senator is so influential that over 130 million dollars ( that’s 130 million!) will have been spent in the effort to engage in the race.  The outside money pouring in doesn’t care about local issues; it cares about converting that money into power on the national stage.  There are many other examples of similarly egregious expenditures for what is supposed to be a contest of ideas  rather than influence peddling, but the mass of money spent has made any developed discussion of ideas an archaic concept.  Blank slates like Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin will win, not because she brings any of her own talent to the solving of the nation’s problems, but because the money will allow the destruction of her opponent as any kind of recognizable alternative.  Millions of dollars are standing behind Baldwin because she is a willing shill for other people’s ideas.  The fall in intellect from Russ Feingold to Tammy Baldwin is steep indeed.

The Trump rallies , with his ever present ability to pull massive, enthusiastic crowds suggest that the President will likely have real influence in the Trump carried states of 2016.  Every election there is a race or two from each party that presents as a total surprise.  I suspect the pattern will continue with a prominent Republican and a prominent Democrat going down to defeat,  but the Trumpian gravity is likely I think to pull 3 or 4 uphill candidates into a position to win.  Likely states?  Indiana and North Dakota – but the tally could easily include Florida, Missouri, and Montana.  54-55 Republican Senators I think is not out of the question.  If the House flips, the Senate will need every one the 54 to somehow keep the country on track.

As soon as the results are tallied on November7th, the process of reassessing the power players will begin, and with it, the landscape of challengers to Trump in 2020.   The unbound economy, the flourishing job market, relative peace, and a returning sense of confidence that is part of our current national landscape would normally be a potent force for staying the course.  America will always remain uncomfortable with such bounty, and look for ways to do penance for success.  A sharp leftward turn in the 2018 election would suggest the country looked at the prospect of America becoming great again, and decided it turned out to be not worthy after all.   A stay the course election, and we may all have to get out our MAGA hats.

When you are so sure you are in the right, that there is no place for the concept of truth, you have arrived at mob rule.  America and its reliance on the two hundred and forty some year old Constitution, and a tradition of rights of the individual and rule of law, teeters at the brink.  In a circus of innuendo and show trial, half the country is willing to throw away the incredibly hard won rights that protect the citizen against the tyranny of the mob, for the prize of a judicial seat on the Supreme Court.

The role of advise and consent that was applied to the Senate by the framers of the Constitution could not have predicted the bastardization of the process that has infected the last forty years.  the Supreme Court was considered the weakest of the three branches, positioned only to make sure that the laws applied by the other two branches respected the limitations of the Constitutional document.  Laws were to be proposed and passed by the people’s representative, the Legislative Branch, and executed by the Executive Branch.  The Court was to secure that laws carried the weight of their intent, and the limitations of their scope as referenced in the Constitution, not formulate the laws themselves.

Somewhere, this went terribly wrong, when the Supreme Court determined to define a law’s intent rather than its constitutionality.  The Democrat Party, having failed through election to achieve societal transformation rapidly enough to secure its permanent position of power, looked to the court as the extra legal way of securing the transformation without being answerable to the voters,

Of all the torrents of societal tumult that led to the wholly unexpected triumph of the renegade candidate Trump to the Presidency, the balance of the Supreme Court was likely the overriding decision maker for the discerning voter.  Trump promised to resist the transformers, and secure textualists to the bench, that would restore the court to its appropriate place in the governance of the country.  When the impossible happened and Trump won, the initial intent was to wound Trump so severely that he would be distracted from his court conversion with the overriding task of defending himself against the onslaught.   It turns out Trump has thus far proved immune to the crushing attacks, and the internal deep state efforts to create subtrifuge have become to crumble.  Gorsuch was the Scalia seat, so the game of destruction was not likely to succeed, but Anthony Kennedy has been the “swing” vote that had allowed the court to maintain undue influence on extra-constitutional processes.  The wound of losing the swing vote was too much to bear, and the politics of destruction were advanced to all out war.  Avoiding the hundreds of hours of testimony and attestations, the party waited until the clock shortened suffienctly to assure the trap was set correctly, than supported through the arm of the accomplice media, pressured the deliberation into an effective show trial.  An accusation without collaboration is the ultimate weapon, as one must deny the accuser rather than the unsupported accusation.

The Soviet show trials of the 1930s and the Red Guard public humiliations of the 1960s did not make any assumptions of fact or truth – none were required.  The process simply put the indiviual on trial for standing in the way of the mob’s justice, and the decisions were preordained.

Brian Kavanaugh knew his judicial philosophy represented a threat to the radicals that had determined as President Obama had stated, to literally transform the nation regardless of the nation’s desire to be so transformed.  He  could not have recognized, however,  that the simple reality of having grown up male in the 1980s would be a dagger to the heart of a fair and respectful review.

Its not clear that Kavanaugh will survive the attacks politically and achieve the seat on the court that he is overly qualified for.  Regardless of outcome, he has been wounded permanently by the new Red Guard that are willing  destroy the country before they give up the fight to resist those that would restrict their power.

Sad to say, the people likely felt the same way in 1860.  Let’s hope we find some way out of the vortex.