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The President Is Toast
From The New York Times, a devastating critique of where the President’s re-election chances stand now that the Democrats are more emboldened in Congress:
At midterm, the once-dazzling political momentum… has stalled. In the year ahead, the President faces what his allies and advisers see as the most critical tests of his Presidency both at home and abroad.
”Historically, the third year is the one that makes or breaks a Presidency,” said one GOP pollster.
”It’s the year when people will judge the President not only by the goals he articulated in the campaign or the legislation he has passed, but how his program has affected their lives,” he continued. ”It’s also a year in which foreign policy will be given a more severe test.”
On the major issues, some of the President’s White House aides and Cabinet associates see similar forks in the political road. They prefer not to be identified in speaking. But privately, some acknowledge their concern that his presidency faces serious difficulties.
Their brimming optimism of 2016 has been tempered by losses in the November elections as well as by stunning defeats in the recent session of Congress. They concede… a perceptible shift in power from the White House toward Congress since November, and open splits and uneasiness among Republicans, especially while there is uncertainty whether the President intends to run in 2020. On Capitol Hill, Republicans grumble that the White House is not being well run but is hobbled by factional tensions.
”If the President doesn’t like the word ‘compromise,’ ” one aide said, ”well then, let’s say he’s got to make some adjustments in the original course. There’s a problem with people who think there’s so much mileage in being right all the time, I don’t care who it is, even the President of the United States.”
”You can’t govern this country when it’s polarized,” said the Republican moderate Senator from Maine. ”I think the President has got to compromise on most issues…”
Political realities have changed dramatically since 2016. The loss of Republican seats in the House has buried the coalition that passed his big tax cuts and has given Democrats control of the House.
Beyond that, White House strategists acknowledge that the elections showed an erosion of public support; many minority, blue collar and elderly voters who supported him in his election went back to the Democratic Party.
They also concede that the election mood will affect the legislative debate. Some of the 19 Republican senators up for re-election are acutely sensitive to avoiding (associating with the President) as they approach the new Congressional session.
In sum, the President’s political impact has diminished. He is not the feared figure of 18 months ago.
In reality, this is from The Times in December of 1982. (Read the original here.) The President was Reagan, not Trump. All I did was mask a few names and change the dates. Trump is not Reagan, but the conventional wisdom is not necessarily wise either. The tires are stuck in the same mud they’ve always been in and they just spin and spin and spin.
Published in Journalism
Interesting to me is that none of the people in the article are actual allies or advisers in any real way. Even in ’82 the press invent facts and then go in search of an example.
It’s almost like he’s saying that people tend to judge a person by how that person most recently impacted them. It is keen observations such as this that make the NYT the cutting-edge paper that it is/was.
“John…may I call you ‘John’? I won’t use your name of course, but am I right in thinking that you feel concern over serious difficulties the presidency faces but that you would prefer not to be identified?”
“Unnnh.”
John continues to sleep sitting upright in his barstool.
“Your anonymity is sacred to me John. See you again next week.”
I find it hard to believe that anybody working for any the President of the United States would have that opinion, much less voice it. But assuming such a person walks the earth, it is hard not to imagine that he is only disgruntled because he didn’t get the pizza toppings he hoped for when he chipped in for the Friday pie event.
Squishes gonna squish.
Yet more penetrating NYT insights.
In Reagan’s day that was William Cohen. His “moderation” got him the Pentagon under Bill Clinton.
That was actually a quote, not from an aide, but Bob Michel, who was the Minority Leader of the House. I wasn’t sure I wanted to attribute it to Kevin McCarthy. Michel, decided to retire in 1994 because, as he saw it, Newt Gingrich was more interested in picking fights than passing laws. Had he been re-elected he could have served as the Majority Leader, but would have been miserable under Speaker Gingrich.
I stand corrected. Sounds like Michel was a muck with a ‘sh’.
I agree that 25-35% of the electorate adores Trump. The problem is that 45-50% of the electorate despises and loathes him. The remaining 15-40% of the electorate have gone Anti-Trump. We cannot win with a majority vote among independents.
Between solid, likely and leaning states, Cook Political Report has the the Dems at 232 Electoral College votes, and Republicans at 220 Electoral College votes, with 5 toss up States with 86 votes total: Florida (29), Pennsylvania (20), Michigan (16), Arizona (11) and Wisconsin (10). To win, Trump must carry 50 Electoral College votes from these 5 states. He won all 5 of the toss-up states in 2016. As of now, he will lose all 5.
Romney, NcCain and W. won Arizona by 9-11 points. Trump won Arizona by 3 points in 2016. In 2008, Arizona last voted for a single state-wide Democrat. In 2018, Arizona voted for four statewide Democrats. In 2018, Arizona has a majority Democrat congressional majority for the first time in 54 years, since 1964. Trump will lose Arizona by three or more points in 2020.
An fair and free election is a coup? Is that what you are saying?
Thanks so much. Getting stronger every day!
The really weird thing about the 2020 election is that it will not be held until 2020. Nor will it be held against a generic unknown Democrat with a blank slate program. Nor will it be governed by the Cook Political Report.
Is panic built into the DNA of right-leaning individuals?
What’s amazing as we watch the Democratic House is how we managed to let those idiots win. Even normal Democrats must recognize…there are still some normal Democrats aren’t there?
We’ll find out when a New York style abortion bill comes up in the House.
I was under the impression that “abortion should be legal until the day of birth” is the very definition of a normal Democrat.
More of this “conventional wisdom” that is just not true.
New deals with Mexico, Canada, the EU were unquestionably better for the U.S.
The tax reduction passed through Congress was necessary for the economy and our business competitiveness in the world. It was his deal that he forced the House and Senate to negotiate.
Your rhetoric reminds me of what President Reagan used to say about democrats in general … It isn’t so much that liberals are ignorant. It’s just that they know so many things that just aren’t so.
If Trump is primaried the Republicans will lose it all. Trump won in 2016 without #NeverTrumper support. Some folks still don’t know how that could have happened.
Much to the delight of Democrats, Republicans always seem to be in panic about their election prospects. This timidity is very useful. It keeps bold ideas about what the government should or shouldn’t do confined to the pages of books, magazines and web sites, as actual legislation might imperil their election chances. It is the political equivalent of the prevent defense in football. They’re not particularly interested in advancing conservative ideals, they just want to slow down or mitigate the progressive agenda.
That’s also how we end up with these discussions where style is always given more weight than substance. But it really doesn’t matter when you’re too timid to do anything of substance to begin with.
Are you listening @garyrobbins?
And perhaps we give them too much benefit of the doubt here as well. One of the very clear components of the never-Trump mindset back in the general election of 2016 was truly an incredibly cavalier indifference to the prospect of a Hillary Clinton administration. They were more concerned about President Trump rocking their status and control of the GOP (even in a minority), rather than Hillary Clinton rocking the country and its Constitution.
Oh, I’m listening.
I am still not bending the knee, nor am I getting on the Trump Train.
Well, then I would suggest that you stop expecting others to “bend the knee” to your will, as well. The process will play itself out.
I would have happily accepted any of the other 16. Ted Cruz was a bit too conservative for my tastes and George Pataki was too liberal, but all of the other 16 were acceptable.
The 17th was and is not acceptable, starting with Birtherism, and proceeding through with mocking the disabled, and Trump’s serial lying such as Ted Cruz’s father helping kill JFK.
I am not going to bend the knee.
I want no one to bend their knee to me or my will.
However after the great 2020 massacre, no one will be able to say that they weren’t warned.
Then find a new song to sing.
Perhaps you are not aware of the insistence of others that Severe Trump Skeptics get on board the Trump Train, and acknowledge our fealty to Trump.
Not going to happen. But I think that Severe Trump Skeptics will be blamed for the Republican Party’s defeat after the Party has lashed itself to Trump.
No one wants you to bend the knee for Trump, or for Reagan for that matter. Presidents aren’t kings – I’m pretty sure that we established that in our early years.
This is exactly right. President Trump has accomplished some neat things during his short time in office but the greatest benefit has been the clear picture presented of what our country has become. It is, after all, very sad.
It’s not your Trump skepticism that bothers people. Or anyone’s skepticism for that matter. It’s the unwillingness to acknowledge the role played by the people you admire and champion in creating the situation that allowed Trump to rise in the first place and your insistence that returning to the kind of cowardly and platitudinous politics is going to cure all of our ills.
If you care about half the things you claim you do – smaller government, debt control, sanctity of life – you’d be as angry with the Bushes, the Flakes and the Kasiches of the world as you are with Trump. But that’s not the case. You champion more ineffectiveness as it is more desirable to you because of “style.”
That’s very clear, is it? It certainly doesn’t describe me or anyone I know. And, by the way, I don’t have any particular “status,” and I certainly don’t “control the GOP.” But there was something in 2016 that scared me worse than four years of a President Hillary Clinton – that was 30 years of a President Hillary Clinton, or worse. It still does.
If you must go back in time and bash people for their 2016 positions, at least try to get their positions right while you’re bashing.
That’s a never-Trump mindset?
You and your heroes Ryan, Flake, Kasich, et al. are helping the GOP drive off the cliff. Don’t say you weren’t warned.
I just pray they don’t drive the country off the cliff.
Relax. If it doesn’t describe you, it doesn’t describe you. Don’t sweat it.
It does describe many of the most vocal never Trumpers here. I don’t know how to use the search function, or it doesn’t function well, but there are a couple of very prominent Rico never Trumpers who put this exact position in writing. This was in the heat of the general election where the focus was on the independent runs of the likes of Kristol and French. I will try to find them just to placate your emotional reaction to my comment.
Didn’t sound emotional to me, just having some fun saying how much worse the alternative that we avoided would have been.