Posted on 12/11/2018 2:41:46 PM PST by Kaslin
If Donald Trump told Michael Cohen to pay hush money to Stormy Daniels about a one-night stand a decade ago, that, says Jerome Nadler, incoming chair of House Judiciary, would be an "impeachable offense."
This tells you what social media, cable TV and the great herd of talking heads will be consumed with for the next two years -- the peccadillos and misdeeds of Trump, almost all of which occurred before being chosen as president of the United States.
"Everywhere President Trump looks," writes The Washington Times' Rowan Scarborough, "there are Democrats targeting him from New York to Washington to Maryland... lawmakers, state attorneys general, opposition researchers, bureaucrats and activist defense lawyers.
"They are aiming at Russia collusion, the Trump Organization, the Trump Foundation, a Trump hotel, Trump tax returns, Trump campaign finances and supposed money laundering."
The full-court press is on. Day and night we will be hearing debate on the great question: Will the elites that loathe him succeed in bringing Trump down, driving him from office, and prosecuting and putting him in jail?
Says Adam Schiff, the incoming chair of the House intelligence committee: "Donald Trump may be the first president in quite some time to face the real prospect of jail time."
And what will a watching world be thinking when it sees the once-great republic preoccupied with breaking yet another president?
Will that world think: Why can't we be more like America?
Does the world still envy us our free press, which it sees tirelessly digging up dirt on political figures and flaying them with abandon?
Among the reasons democracy is in discredit and retreat worldwide is that its exemplar and champion, the USA, is beginning to resemble France's Third Republic in its last days before World War II.
Also, democracy no longer has the field largely to itself as to how to create a prosperous and powerful nation-state.
This century, China has shown aspiring rulers how a single-party regime can create a world power, and how democracy is not a necessary precondition for extraordinary economic progress.
Vladimir Putin, an autocratic nationalist, has shown how a ruined nation can be restored to a great power in the eyes of its people and the world, commanding a new deference and respect.
Democracy is a bus you get off when it reaches your stop, says Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdogan. After the attempted coup in the summer of 2017, Erdogan purged his government and military of tens of thousands of enemies and jailed more journalists than any other nation.
Yet he is welcomed in the capitals of the world.
What does American democracy now offer the world as its foremost attribute, its claim to greatness?
"Our diversity is our strength!" proclaims this generation.
We have become a unique nation composed of peoples from every continent and country, every race, ethnicity, culture and creed on earth.
But is not diversity what Europe is openly fleeing from?
Is there any country of the Old Continent clamoring for more migrants from the Maghreb, sub-Sahara or Middle East?
Broadly, it seems more true to say that the world is turning away from transnationalism toward tribalism, and away from diversity and back to the ethno-nationalism whence the nations came.
The diversity our democracy has on offer is not selling.
Ethnic, racial and religious minorities, such as the Uighurs and Tibetans in China, the Rohingya in Myanmar, minority black tribes in sub-Sahara Africa and white farmers in South Africa, can testify that popular majority rule often means mandated restrictions or even an end to minority rights.
In the Middle East, free elections produced a Muslim Brotherhood president in Egypt, Hamas in Palestine, Hezbollah in Lebanon. After this, a disillusioned Bush 43 White House called off the democracy crusade.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, relates how one minority is treated in much of the Muslim world:
"Christians face daily the threat of violence, murder, intimidation, prejudice and poverty..."
"In the last few years, they have been slaughtered by so-called Islamic State. ... Hundreds of thousands have been forced from their homes. Many have been killed, enslaved and persecuted or forcibly converted. Even those who remain ask the question, 'Why stay?'
"Christian communities that were the foundation of the universal Church now face the threat of imminent extinction."
And all the while this horror is going on, Ronald Reagan's treaty that banned all U.S. and Soviet nuclear missiles with a range between 310 and 3,400 miles faces collapse. And President Trump's initiative to bring about a nuclear-free North Korea appears in peril.
Yet, for the next two years, we will be preoccupied with whether paying hush money to Stormy Daniels justifies removing a president, and exactly when Michael Cohen stopped talking to the Russians about his boss building a Trump Tower in Moscow.
We are an unserious nation, engaged in trivial pursuits, in a deadly serious world.
Democracy is only as good as the people who participate in it. Garbage in...Garbage out.
Pat always hits the nail on the head.
Schitt may be one of the first congressscum in quite some time to face the real prospect of a hemp party...
We are an unserious nation, engaged in trivial pursuits, in a deadly serious world.
Terrific article. Thanks.
Why discussion of "democracy"?? The USA is not and never has been a democracy. In fact, a lot of our problems come from groups trying to force the USA republic into a "democracy" straight-jacket.
It is a good thing that we are a Republic and not a democracy. Hillary would have all the assets of the country in no time. Trump is draining the swamp but it is fighting back. I can’t wait for the arrests to start.
That pretty much sums it up.
Gird Your Loins.
Been hearing this for two years. Only people behind bars are anyone associated with Trump over the years, and ridiculous imprisoning, too. I suspect you will never get the arrests you want.
Buchanan is brilliant. Even more so here than usual.
I choose optimism, though. I am no great fan of President Trump, but I respect him and have considerable confidence. Strangely, I trust Speaker Pelosi in ways that I do not trust other Democrats; and I predict without benefit of any evidence that these two leaders will keep the worst from happening.
I am not sorry that Pelosi has replaced the feckless Ryan. Having her as Speaker provides someone with whom President Trump can actually negotiate and strike deals.
I see Pelosi as smart, tough and in charge. I do not believe that she wants her majority wasted for the next two years on matters that risk only downside for her agenda. When push comes to shove I predict that Mueller, Schiff et al fold their tents and walk away from all of this nonsense. They may cast aspersions, but no charges and no recriminations. Pelosi may extract a quid pro quo — Hillary, Comey, McCabe, and that entire risible crowd skate too; and I think McConnell, President Trump and others take that deal in a nanosecond.
None of this dealing will sit well with the base of either party. But it will allow the country to move forward.
I will s*ck. And yet it is the best and perhaps the only way out.
Democracy: two wolves and a deer voting on what to have for dinner
....and ten years before Odungo was elected he crawl around Chicago bath houses on his knees....
Actually arrests are well under way. Thousands of MS13 members are locked up. A bunch of child molesters are gone also. You can not get some people if the judges are in the same party.
HOW THE WHITE RACE IS LOSING A WORLD IT BUILT
actually
In two generations
I think the arrests were referring to the Deep State, not the illegals.
In free Republic early days Pat was vilified by the weak and multicultural
That doesn’t advance your point. Why the compulsion?
You gave Pelosi no such preface.
Join the side you’re on.
They'd better be careful what they ask for.
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>> “What does American democracy now offer the world as its foremost attribute, its claim to greatness?” <<
Fortunately, our constitution forbids “Democracy!”
Democracy is the very lest desirable form of governance. Democracy is a fox, a wolf, and a chicken voting on who is for lunch.
We must defeat democracy world wide.
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