If you’ve been worrying about the big Oroville dam in California bursting open, this Gen. Flynn thing could bring a much bigger flood. After 24 days, three and half weeks, the regime of Our Orange Leader is already up to its spray tanned jowls in a scandal bigger than Watergate.
That’s hyperbole!, you say? Well, no one ever accused Richard Nixon of regularly communicating with the Russians while they were doing their nefarious best to screw with an American presidential election. And G. Gordon Liddy was not the President’s key and, according to reports, sole advisor on foreign affairs. Baby, oh baby. Even I thought it’d be mid-summer before Trump got himself into something so outrageously, cartoonishly foul that the usual “Let’s move on, nothing to see here, folks” Republican “leaders” would be on TV demanding to know what exactly there is … to see here.
But that’s where we are … three and a half weeks into this fiasco. Clearly, some Republicans have already decided Trump is too ludicrous an embarrassment to protect with sealed-off, behind closed doors committee investigations. Moreover, if reports are true that U.S. intelligence agencies are withholding intelligence from Trump and his team of Russian-compromised know-nothings, the sooner the swap-out of Mike Pence for Trump happens, the better.
The schadenfreude-rich beauty of the Flynn debacle is how it whips the spotlight back around, away from the sideshow of fools and scoundrels joining Trump’s cabinet, and zeros it back in on what kind of business Trump has been doing with the Russians for the past 30 years. We have a pretty good idea, but to date none of the circumstantial (and better) assertions have grabbed the full attention, simultaneously, of our brave Congressional leaders and the national media herd.
The cynical assumption is that this Flynn business, which as we now know has been going on for months, not just between Flynn and various Russian officials, but other members of Trump’s campaign/administration, will be stifled and prevaricated over by Republican-led committees. They’ll muddle it and obscure it until the “failing” The New York Times and Jake Tapper lose interest or are distracted by the next farcical scandal or, god forbid, bona fide international crisis.
But I don’t see that happening, and I lived through Watergate. Why? Because this Flynn episode is hair’s breadth from the rich, juicy essence of Donald Trump — namely, the high likelihood he was bailed out of chronic bankruptcy by Russian money and has engaged in colossal tax fraud for decades. Being first to expose what so many, in and out government and media believe to be a monumental con game comes with guarantee of heroic historical standing of the eternal, name-in-schoolbooks variety.
My pal, Joe Loveland, correctly assessed the Republicans’ predicament over disposing Trump for Mike Pence. Basically, they’re prepared to do it, preferably before the 2018 mid-term elections, as long as they don’t have to take any responsibility for it. Most Republicans, batshit craven and otherwise, live in fear of Trump’s low-to-no information base. But if Trump brings the… house of cards … down on himself with a ceaseless bombardment of revelations about scheming with … the f****ing Russians for chrissakes (every old school Republican’s ultimate boogeyman) … they can stand back like mere horrified observers, while doing everything they can to polish up the medieval dunce Mike Pence as the only acceptable replacement.
The wild and terrifying card in this drama is of course the “Reichstag fire” scenario, where Team Trump plots to distract public/Congressional/media attention by either inventing, grossly exaggerating or ineptly bungling some serious international crisis. In normal times you, dear reader, would be excused for rolling your eyes at the wild-eyed lunacy of such a scenario. I mean, stuff like that doesn’t happen in The United States.
Unfortunately, like the dossier with stories of the Rooskies storing video of Donald and hookers, um, “micturating” on Obama’s hotel bed in Moscow, there’s a level of plausibility to almost every obscene, outrageous thing you can imagine about Trump that we’ve never dealt with before. Not even with Dick Nixon.
Man, am I tired of winning so much.
As always, I agree with almost everything Mr. Lambert says.
I agree it’s a breathtakingly huge deal.
I agree that many more dots are likely to be connected by a well incented press corps.
I agree that many Trump voters will eventually disown him, or, as so many Jesse Ventura voters did, refused to admit in polite company that they ever voted for him.
But I still disagree that there is sufficient congressional courage to cross the segment of the Trump base that will stick with Trump through this.
Until and unless there is excetiatory video evidence, or something of that ilk, I think millions of Trump voters will stick with Trump, and therefore power-hungry congressional conservatives won’t have the integrity and courage to cross them.
I hope to God I don’t win on this one.
When it comes to a test of how craven they can be, Congressional Republicans will always score A+ or higher. Real bigly, if you know what I mean. They’re an electioneering party, not a governing party. But … once there’s blood in the water the deeply craven adjust their calculations. The scenario I see is an external force … the drip, drip of Trump-Russia collusion, followed by some enormous explosion, (proof he ordered Flynn, or best yet, an independent prosecutor with subpoena power for his taxes). Shit happens all over, and GOP minions and “Leaders” are left as stunned observers to the hell Trump has brought down himself. I.e. none of their fingerprints on his demise, plus, a wholly acceptable replacement standing … right there. And we really are talking about the full-bore Trump droolers here. Those folks aren’t exactly detail people, and can be easily convinced at Town Halls (if they can find the location) that their representative has made a valiant effort to resist “the liberal witch hunt.” Tribal Republicans on the other will be tremendously relieved with the Pence-for-Trump move.
Hey Brian, been ‘enjoying’ your commentary lately. A bit of sanity in the midst of the “Orange” insanity..You and I, the same newspaper, much effecting both of us. It made me a lifelong media watcher, and taught us both Photography. Regards to You ~ Jeff.
Hey Jeff, how you doing? I was cleaning files a couple weeks ago and found a bunch of clips from the Montevideo American-News. I’m checking to see if the Smithsonian is interested.