Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, began incessantly rapping on his desk in protest during a congressional hearing and was threatened with removal from the chambers. The moment came as former Attorney General Donald Ayer was testifying before the House Judiciary Committee about Attorney General William Barr.
The Republican Fausts
But if the last 10 days have made anything clear, it’s this: The Republican Fausts are in an untenable position. The deal they’ve struck with the devil comes at too high a price. It really will cost them their soul.
In the first place, the Trump administration is not a Republican administration; it is an ethnic nationalist administration. Trump insulted both parties equally in his Inaugural Address. The Bannonites are utterly crushing the Republican regulars when it comes to actual policy making.
.. Third, it’s becoming increasingly clear that the aroma of bigotry infuses the whole operation, and anybody who aligns too closely will end up sharing in the stench.
The administration could have simply tightened up the refugee review process and capped the refugee intake at 50,000, but instead went out of its way to insult Islam. The administration could have simply tightened up immigration procedures, but Trump went out of his way to pick a fight with all of Mexico.
Other Republicans have gone far out of their way to make sure the war on terrorism is not a war on Islam or on Arabs, but Trump has gone out of his way to ensure the opposite. The racial club is always there.
.. “Precisely because the problem is one of temperament and character, it will not get better. It will get worse, as power intoxicates Trump and those around him.
.. It will probably end in calamity — substantial domestic protest and violence, a breakdown of international economic relationships, the collapse of major alliances, or perhaps one or more new wars (even with China) on top of the ones we already have. It will not be surprising in the slightest if his term ends not in four or in eight years, but sooner, with impeachment or removal under the 25th Amendment.”
.. Already one sees John McCain and Lindsey Graham forming a bit of a Republican opposition. The other honorable senators will have to choose: Collins, Alexander, Portman, Corker, Cotton, Sasse and so on and so on.
.. With most administrations you can agree sometimes and disagree other times. But this one is a danger to the party and the nation in its existential nature.
In Ban on Migrants, Trump Supporters See a Promise Kept
“Mr. Trump goes out of his way to offend nearly everything the left values,” said Philip E. Tetlock, a political psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania and the author of “Superforecasting.” “He even takes glee in it.”
.. It also may serve his purposes, if an angry left riles up the right, heightening the sense of battle on both sides — and endearing him to his supporters even more.
.. “These people in Manhattan, they don’t know what’s going on in the outer boroughs,” he said. “These immigrants, they don’t come to 86th Street; they come to Port Richmond Avenue on Staten Island.” He added that Manhattanites are “not going to be affected. We are the ones that feel it.”