Fire, pestilence and a country at war with itself: the Trump presidency is over

[Judi Lynn]

Robert Reich

A pandemic unabated, an economy in meltdown, cities in chaos over police killings. All our supposed leader does is tweet

Sun 31 May 2020 01.00 EDT Last modified on Sun 31 May 2020 01.02 EDT

You’d be forgiven if you hadn’t noticed. His verbal bombshells are louder than ever, but Donald J Trump is no longer president of the United States.

By having no constructive response to any of the monumental crises now convulsing America, Trump has abdicated his office.

He is not governing. He’s golfing, watching cable TV and tweeting.

How has Trump responded to the widespread unrest following the murder in Minneapolis of George Floyd, a black man who died after a white police officer knelt on his neck for minutes as he was handcuffed on the ground?

More:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/may/31/donald-trump-coronavirus-pandemic-george-floyd-minneapolis-tweets

[Squinch]

1. That's not how it worked for Nixon.

[murielm99]

2. I don't understand what you mean, Squinch.

I don't mean that in a nasty way, so please do not snarl at me. We are all a bit fragile right now.

I just don't understand what you are saying.

[Gore1FL]

7. I can't speak for Squinch, but they way I interpreted it was...

...Trump hasn't abdicated anything until his sorry ass leaves on a helicopter and doesn't come back.

In other words, I think it was a word-choice criticism of the article.

[Squinch]

9. No, I know you don't mean it nastily.

What I mean is that we have a historical example of things going the other way.

In the run up to the 1968 election, there had been widespread riots - antiwar, and riots after the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy. Nixon used the fear the riots raised in people. He ran on a "law and order" message, used lots of dog whistles, stoked racism and that was a lot of the reason why he won the election.

[murielm99]

11. Nixon was not the incumbent.

Trump is. I think that is one big difference. People will hold trump responsible for all these messes: the economy, the poor response to the virus, the racism, the out of control cops.

This country is not as white as it was in 1968.

Humphrey backed up all the mistakes his boss Johnson made over the war in Vietnam. People were beginning to hate the war by then.

There are quite a few other differences. The economy was good in 1968.

The racial unrest and the looting are only one part of the situation now. If things calm down, we will still have the pandemic, unemployment and a moribund economy. People will blame trump, and rightly so.

We will have to work at it, but we can get Biden elected. I can't imagine how bad it will be if we do not.

[Squinch]

12. I hope you're right, and yes. We MUST get Biden elected. But I don't know that

these events mean the end of Donny Bodybags.

We are very dependent on a few demographics that have peeled away from the Republicans since the last election. They are the numbers we need to overcome gerrymandering and cheating. Suburban white women and elders are two of these demographics, and they might get squirrely if Republicans start spouting law and order propaganda.

[Vogon_Glory]

8. Tricky Dick was able to parlay the 1968 riots into political capital

The US was majority-white back in 1968, and despite the racial and economic divisions of the time, most voters thought that things were fundamentally pretty good and that the politicians had their interests at heart, even if the righties of the time thought they were too left-wing and airy-fairy.

Also, love him or hate him, Richard Nixon was a far cleverer politician than the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Fast-forward to 2020. The country isn’t so white anymore, the good times are over, most people are scared about their future, and most people realize that Donald Trump doesn’t give a rat’s rump about them.

[Squinch]

10. But those suburban white moms are a needed swing vote. As are the elders who have recently

rejected Donny Bodybags because he is willing to let them die.

I just hope they continue to peel off from him and we don't lose ground with those demographics.

[elleng]

3. It's true, as far as it goes.

Much of the country is burning, either literally or medically.

[RandySF]

4. If only I could be so sure.

[BigmanPigman]

5. Don't I know it!

They lie and cheat and steal and are masters at it. With Putin pulling his strings it is not a slam dunk, by far.

[sop]

6. Trump's presidency is effectively over now, the end began when he first called COVID-19 a "hoax"

These days Trump is behaving like Dean Gerard Winters, the guy who plays "Mayhem" in the Allstate Insurance commercials.