I agree that Trump promises to be a disaster for Democrats, the entire nation, and the world. However, what I’m wondering about is whether it is wise for us as a strategy, now that the election is over and only by resigning or dying will Trump not be inaugurated, to spend so much energy on belittling him, hating him, and promising that we will do everything we can to make his administration fail.
The worst move strategically that the Republicans did, as Obama was being inaugurated, was, in their famous meeting, to decide that their highest priority was to make sure that Obama would be a failure as president.* Although they could only through scat from the back benches in 2009-2010, as we lost our solid Democratic government and they made more inroads into Congress, they kept their pledge.
One result of their pledge is that it gave us a ready-made excuse for all of the 52% or so of Obama’s campaign promises that were either not kept or kept only partially: faced with such an obstructionist Congress, what could anyone do?
I would argue that we have already gone well past that little 2009 Republican strategy meeting in our explicit pledges to not just make Trump a failure but to make everyone see him as elected illegitimately, mentally ill, unqualified, traitorous, a rapist and possible child molester, and a small-handed individual.† We have lowered the bar so low that it’s more part of the floor tile decoration than it is a bar. In other words, we have given Trump a get-out-of-jail card. Any failure in governing, any at all, will be attributable by them to unprecedented Democratic interference.
I believe that this is why some of our party leaders, including President Obama, have struck a different chord. As Obama put it: if the Republicans can come up with a healthcare plan superior to the ACA, he will support it. Similarly, some Democrats in Congress have been chastised by us for stating that if the Republicans will work with them to create legislation that is worthy of support, they will support it. That is, these Democratic leaders are saying to the GOP: “The ball’s in your court, let’s see what you’ve got. It’s up to you to come up with something good, and if you do, we’ll help. Otherwise, you’re on your own.”
Note that this approach doesn’t a priori help the Republicans to come up with anything worthy, and it doesn’t promise any support unless merited. However, it also doesn’t create an excuse for Republican failure. If the ship sinks, it’ll still be on them, not on us. On the other hand, if by some miracle, some rogue Republicans do work with Democrats to create something worthy, then not only will something good happen, but both Republicans and Democrats will be due credit for it.
So, on tactical grounds, I think we should dial the ad hominem attacks down quite a bit. Once specific proposals are on the table or specific actions have been taken, they can be evaluated and either condemned or praised. I think that this quieter, more conditional approach will in the end be more devastating to the GOP (because I doubt they are capable of creating anything worthy of our support) and beneficial to the nation (because Democrats may have had moderating input on the bipartisan product).
There’s another reason why I’d love to see all the Trump hatred reduced to a dull roar. One of the things I was excited about as Election Day approached was that once the election was over and Hillary elected, all of the media bush-wa about Trump would disappear. I was s o tired of it. But that was back in November: now I’m r e a l l y tired of it. If our whole plan for the next 2-4 years is to keep ad-hominem attacking Trump, then I’m not sure I’ll be able to stand it.
*Or it was at least unwise to allow the content of that meeting to become public.
†Yes, they did similar things to Obama, and they now may have won an election as a direct result, but note that they have no clear Yes agenda, since all they were doing for the past eight years is to say No to things that we did. I really don’t want us to be in that position. Can’t we just get back to debating policy instead of blow jobs, birth certificates, and golden showers? Also note that while GOP obstructionism gave us excuses for Obama, it excused nothing from their point of view: the converse will be true regarding Democratic obstructionism being considered exculpatory by the GOP.