Hang On, Hang In

Ten years ago – hell, five years ago – would anybody have believed that a sitting President of the United States of America would have 24 separate investigations going on about his administration, business, and charity dealings? Back then, one investigation would have been headlined for days, weeks, and even months. Today, it's, “Oh, another investigation? My, my.”

So what are all these investigations going to come to when the great clouds of smoke clear? Lots of evidence of collusion, witness tampering, various financial frauds, compulsive lying, perjury, and obstruction of justice among others, sure – but, again, so what? 

If the Republican-controlled Senate has not abandoned Trump after endless recorded evidence of the most corrupt administration in the history of this country – and maybe in the history of the world going back to Nero and Caligula – they will not move from that cemented stance unless Trump actually does shoot somebody on Fifth Avenue – and then it would have to be a close relative of a Republican senator or maybe even an actual senator, Democrat, of course. 

Nancy Pelosi had it sort of right when she said Trump isn't worth the national pain of impeachment. I think what she really meant was that it would be a total exercise in futility given the math in the Senate. It takes two-thirds of the Senate to remove a president. No way today.

So, given some kind of political miracle, Trump is in until the 2020 election. And the road to that election is going to be paved with an endless ragtime stream of Trumpian vilification of any Democrat he sees as having a shot against him.  And his congressional chorus will be right there, braying and whining along with him.  

Forget about Mueller indicting him because the DOJ is still laboring under the quaint notion found in two obscure memos that a sitting president can't be indicted because he'd be too busy with affairs of state to go to trial. Does “executive time” count as “affairs of state?” 

So it's hang on for a crazy ride to the election, but for real hang in with the notion that justice does triumph and right does prevail even in this splintered shadow of America. Hopefully, the Democratic race for the nomination will be exemplary against what Trump will be doing and saying.

And, presumably, there will be presidential debates despite all the current Fox noise. And, again presumably, the Democratic candidate will have the smarts and the attitude to put Donald Trump in the short pants he deserves and so easily wears when someone gets in his ugly, puffy, squinty, weird-ass-orange face.  

His base is a given, as are most Republicans. That still leaves a lot of room. Hillary Clinton actually got 3 million more votes than Trump, which everybody now knows except Trump. The mid-terms were a Democratic runaway in the House and there was a big turnout. Trump's so-called “key” states are now totally in play and by the time the election gets here a lot of so-called “working class” people who voted for Trump are going to get the message that it was a con and cross over.

But, in the end, you get the president you deserve.