Maybe the mind is so shot that Donald Trump truly believes he didn’t call countries full of dark-skinned people “shitholes” yesterday. That’s certainly how he tried to play it today, claiming he has a “wonderful relationship with Haitians.” I’m guessing he employs some at his Florida properties — they work cheap.
Sen. Dick Durbin put the kibosh on that lie, confirming Trump said it, adding “repeatedly.” What will Congress do about it? Probably nothing, because we all know they won’t go against Trump. Nevertheless, Jonathan Alter suggests a move far short of impeachment: an official censure.
Andrew Jackson — whose painting Steve Bannon told Trump to hang in the Oval Office — is the only president ever censured (for not turning over certain bank documents). Senator Joe McCarthy was censured in 1954 for dishonoring the Senate with his anti-Communist character assassination, which was engineered by Trump’s mentor, Roy Cohn. Censure is what I and a lot of other people argued was the right punishment for Bill Clinton in the Monica Lewinsky case. It wasn’t enough for Republicans who backed impeachment—some of the same Republicans (I’m looking at you, Orrin Hatch) who today think Trump is “one of the best” presidents.
Alter acknowledges it almost certainly wouldn’t happen, but argues it would be the smart thing for Republicans to do if they don’t want to lose control of him altogether.
But they aren’t smart, and they aren’t doing their jobs, either. Michael Tomasky argues that if the Republicans in Congresskeep failing to fulfill their constitutional duties, we are no longer functioning as a democracy.
More evidence that Trump is losing it came in his interview with the Wall Street Journal, summarized at length here. One highlight among many:
Let me, let me tell you something about the wall. So I’ve always said we have to have a wall. I’ve also said Mexico’s got to pay for it—sometimes you know on occasion, I’d add who’s going to pay for it? Mexico. Well they will pay for it, OK? There are many forms of payment. I could name 10 right now. There are many forms of payment, I didn’t say how.
Many liberals think Trump’s supporters will never abandon him, and I’m sure some never will — hell, 18% of New Jersey voters still approve of Chris Christie. But many more are just people who were snookered by a con man, like the workers at that Carrier plant in Indiana who are now being laid off, and they realize it now. Remember, it’s easy to get people to believe something they want to believe, but very few of them are so resistant to reality that they’ll believe it forever.
In Arizona, the “establishment” politician Republicans want for the Senate race to replace Jeff Flake announced her candidacy yesterday. Rep. Martha McSally, a former Air Force colonel and fighter pilot, told her party to grow a pair of ovaries. Why, so Donald Trump can grab them?