Republicans will never stand up to Donald Trump. None of them has the courage or the morality to do it.
How many posts have you read saying this? How helpful is this thinking?
Not very, say I with all due respect. Now don’t get me wrong. I have almost no respect for virtually anyone in the current GOP. They are cowards, liars, and predators. I expect nothing from their characters and they have repudiated any recognizable principles.
However, I do not conclude that the GOP will ultimately fail to play a key role in the removal of Trump. I think they actually will. My guess is that Trump resigns sometime in late summer or early fall, and that the GOP will claim some of the credit. My argument follows.
Thinking through Realpolitik Lenses
I don’t buy the typical hand-wringing dismissal of possibilities because I don’t think it offers a cogent or helpful analysis. It substitutes paralyzing despair for sound tactical thinking. And despite its apparent negativity, it does not effectively deal with the core dynamic of Realpolitik.
We have heard—and often said—ad museum that the normal laws of politics have been suspended in the Trump Era. They have not. Politics is now just as pragmatic a game as it has ever been. It’s about building and consolidating a power base to accumulate wealth within a given circumstantial context.
I become impatient with those who lament that GOP Congress critters lack the courage to stand up to Trump because the question is not about courage. Rank and file politicians NEVER act out of courage. Unusually brave leaders do often step up, but they accomplish nothing if the rank and file don’t follow them. And the rank and file never do anything that isn’t Realpolitik.
Consider two contrasting examples: Jeff Flake and Elizabeth Warren. Warren speaks bravely and finds a following, albeit a following much smaller than what it should be. Flake speaks bravely (I mean, whatever his limits, you have to give him some props for standing up in this party) and stands alone. No one in the GOP follows.
OK, why? Are Democratic leaders better people? No. It isn’t about the people. It’s about the very different Realpolitik dynamics in the parties. Warren has an interest group standing with her. Flake does not.
Realpolitik Realities
Once we begin to examine the Realpolitik at work in the GOP, we can begin to understand how it works, its limitations, and how to proceed tactically. Let’s begin with some realities.
Donald Trump is deeply disliked in the GOP. And a party built on basic organizational competence knows full well how dangerous and destructive his brand of chaos is. The GOP contains many, many “grownups” who may be predators, but understand the idea of competence. The GOP understands that his recklessness threatens all sort of political and economic institutions which they have learned to milk with sublime artistry. The GOP would carve Trump into pieces an hour from now … if they thought they could do it.
We MUST remember that! The GOP despises Trump.
Well, most of GOP leaders, public and behind the scenes—let’s call them the Wise Guys—despise Trump. There is another factor involved besides Realpolitik: ideology. I’ll try to resist going too deeply into the weeds on ideology, but for now let’s just point out the fact that, as we all know, the GOP has bred many True-Believing ideologues of truly astonishing stupidity who have given feverish devotion to Trump. And therein lies the problem the GOP faces.
The interests of Realpolitik call on GOP wise guys to cultivate wealth for the oligarchy. This is hard to do in a functioning democracy because these interests form a tiny minority of the voting public. So, for 40 years, the GOP has ridden a propaganda machine that has fabricated and sold a poisonous ideology blinding enough voters to their own interests enough to empower an oligarchic agenda.
However, after decades of economic frustration, the GOP base has become, like a long term addict, more and more resistant to all but the most virulent ideological heroin. The Tea Party itself was an early sign that the ideology was breaking down, and the GOP wise guys began to have trouble controlling its worst ideologues. Those extremist nut cases were crucial to maintain the base, but they made governance impossible. Trump, really, is just the culmination of a trend of extremism that has crippled most of the GOP agenda. The Wise Guys who want to sail under the radar and run predatory but largely competent money-making operations have got to share power with ideological lunatics incapable of practical thinking.
Of course, there is nothing new in the last couple of paragraphs. You all know this stuff. Yet these core realities are important to keep in mind if we are going to think clearly and tactically.
Realpolitik Calculations
So let’s think about today’s GOP. There is a lunatic wing of the GOP that has drunk ALL of the Trump KoolAid. These Deplorables are out of touch and impossible to reach. BUT … they are not the majority in the Caucus. Speakers of the GOP House cannot function because of the deep divide in the caucus. To lump the Loonies with the Wise Guys in one basket is lazy thinking and poor tactics.
The Wise Guys don’t do that. They understand a couple of things we often forget:
- The margin the GOP must maintain to remain in power is very thin and is based on many people not voting.
- Much of their own base is around the bend and would retaliate if the Wise Guys were to be seen as unfaithful to Trump as the embodiment of the lunatics’ deepest and darkest fantasies.
- However, a significant portion of the GOP base is pragmatic enough to recognize and flee from chaos. A great example of this demographic is the educated suburbanite who is turning away from a party which is being identified with Lunacy.
- Trumpism, which the GOP needed to cobble together a “winning” (though still minority) coalition is powerfully motivating opponents, including seldom-voting ethnicities—to show up at the polls this November.
- Very real economic challenges lie ahead both locally (the debt as a cost of the stupid tax bill) and internationally (e.g. Russia-inspired threats to NATO and the EU).
- They are probably going to lose a lot of seats at all levels this November.
- Trump is a disaster who threatens ALL interests and has to go. (Yes. I am deeply convinced that all the Wise Guys know this.)
Realpolitik Tactics
This is the Realpolitik context the GOP is facing. The decisions made by creeps like Ryan and McConnell have nothing to do with either principle or courage. They act out of pure calculation:
- How much can they minimize the losses in November?
- How quickly can they recover after November?
- How much of the Oligarchic gains of the last year can they hold on to?
Can the damage being done by Trump be contained within manageable limits until November?
As they calculate, I think the GOP Wise Guys face two key questions:
- How much blame can they pass off onto Democrats?
- How permanent is the damage Trump is doing to their brand?
That last question … that’s the fulcrum that may decide the fate of American democracy.
Here’s what the GOP wants to conclude. The damage of the Trump effect is limited and short-lived. People will soon forget and the Party will be able to reel those suburban voters back in again in a cycle or two.
IF THAT IS THE CASE …
Then here’s the Realpolitik strategy: stall until November, 2018 let the Dems have Congress, and let THEM be the ones to impeach Trump. Then punish the Dems for decades for having done it, just as they repeatedly punish Dems for saving the nation’s economy after they screw it up. I am personally convinced that this is what GOP leadership is trying to do.
IF THIS IS NOT THE CASE, if the damage done by Trump to the GOP brand is looking to be stubbornly lasting …
Then here’s the Realpolitik strategy: get in front of the Trump issue before November. Gain some recognition for having been part of the solution.
THIS DOES NOT MEAN that I think the GOP will impeach. They will not. Ever.
But, as I have argued before, GOP Wise Guys, supported by non-Russian moneyed interests domestic and global, could all too easily meet with Trump, tell him it’s time to go, and offer him incentives for doing so. Let Trump scream betrayal, but start re-gaining support from non-loony rightists by re-establishing some semblance of legitimacy.
How and when might this happen? I see two possible scenarios:
1) The disaster of Trump might bring the level of chaos in the nation to a point where the GOP must respond. We are not there yet, but I don’t think we are far off. Mueller. Brit investigations of Cambridge Analytica. Porn scandals. Trump himself hollowing out the cabinet and staff and instigating retaliation from the FBI and military. His regime is not far from becoming untenable at a level that the Wise Guys won’t be able to sustain.
2) I think a lot depends on the politics of Sept. and Oct. Remember the key question: how large and how lasting is Trump’s damage to our brand? If the looming election really is shaping up as a tsunami, they’ll have a strong political incentive to get right on Trump at the last minute. If it looks manageable, I think they’ll leave Trump for the Dems to handle.
I believe these are the calculations and choices facing the GOP. They have nothing whatever to do with courage or principle, except for the predatory ideology that drives all conservative power structures. They come down to a simple calculus: can we contain the damage Trump is doing to the economy and the party until November and let the Dems take over? Or is that damage not manageable? Do we need to get a piece of the credit for solving the Trump problem before November?
Well, this is one guy’s reading. But, please, let’s not talk about courage or principle any more when assessing the GOP. It’s futile, irrelevant, and an unhelpful guide to tactics.