POLL: Countdown to Impeachment

[DWill]

One thing about his situation I could say seems certain: unless Mueller turns up something of truly shocking illegality that tags Trump himself, the Republican Congress will not act to impeach Trump. Simple collusion or conspiracy even if proved beyond doubt won't motivate the Repubs to risk their upper hand. Once Rump's predatory sex behavior is brushed aside, it becomes easier to ignore political crimes as well.

But unless the Democrats badly misplay their hand (don't put it past them), Trump won't survive beyond 2020. He'll be replaced with a different candidate or he'll lose badly if they run him..

[LanDroid]

As bad as Trump is, what makes you think he'd lose in 2020? All he needs is a little name calling to devastate the other candidate. Low Energy Jeb and Little Marco were DONE almost immediately. Crooked Hillary "Lock her up" took longer and she also had a busload of baggage, but it still had an effect.

The next candidate will have to figure out a way to destroy the effect of name calling. Just for fun, let's say it's Elizabeth Warren. Trump already has the nickname "Pocahontas" set up, he just needs to add an adjective. Perhaps "Fake Pocahontas" or something like "Putrid Pocahantas." By 2020 I bet even "Professor Pocahontas" (can't you hear the boooos?) would kill that campaign.

Trump also has the shooting on 5th Avenue effect: loyal supporters never waiver.

Very simply, we cannot count on Trump to lose on his demerits! We need to find someone who would put the STOMP to all that and beat him. I expect if the Dems ran someone like a four star general, Trump would have a hard time with his usual antics. But who would that be? We have absolutely no idea at this point, so the threat of 8 years of Trump continues...

[LevV]

As bad as Trump is, what makes you think he'd lose in 2020? All he needs is a little name calling to devastate the other candidate.

I'm sure you realize what you are saying about the American voter when you make that claim about Trump's ability to sway the electorate so easily.
Personally, I can't believe that he could sway enough voters to move enough beyond his 30% to 33% base to win reelection in 2020.

[Robert Tulip]

I can't believe that he could sway enough voters to move enough beyond his 30% to 33% base to win reelection in 2020.

Trump reminds me a lot of Ronald Reagan. Reagan's 1980 win was relatively close, winning the popular vote by eight million over Carter. Then his 1984 win was a landslide by seventeen million. His 1980 theme was 'let's make America great again.' He scared a lot of people by installing short range first strike nukes in Germany, closing down the pilot's union, expanding the military and a bunch of other right wing stuff that people have forgotten. "There you go again" and "morning in America" and "there's got to be a pony" covered a multitude of sins. And then Bush got re-elected after wasting a trillion dollars on the Iraq adventure. I don't get why people think Trump is so different, looks like rose coloured glasses.

[LanDroid]

^Agreed.^
Trump currently enjoys a 78% job approval rating with Republicans.
Sorry to get repetitious, but LevV seems to think Trump must lose based on his demerits, which I advised against. No, to lose someone must actually beat Trump and his tacticians. Duh! Who could accomplish that? It's still early, but until / if that is determined, I believe Trump can win.

Yes this does make a statement about American voters. Consider: All of Trump's current problems in character, attention span, judgement, truthlessness, etc. were exposed and understood during the election. He won. (Perhaps I'll cheer up if the mid-terms wrest significant power from Trump's supporters in the legislative branch.)

[geo]

Trump reminds me a lot of Ronald Reagan . . . don't get why people think Trump is so different, looks like rose coloured glasses.

I see very few similarities between Reagan and Trump beyond the connection to show business. Reagan was the governor of California from 1967 to 1975, so he actually had political experience before being elected POTUS. Reagan had a much greater understanding and respect for U.S. history and political traditions than Trump. His desire for a strong military was at least based on conservative intellectual ideas of the time, whether we agree with them or not. Reagan also had a friendly, Everyman persona with good communication skills. People could really identify with him, whereas Trump is likable only through his braggadocio. He's actually a very poor communicator. He has virtually no experience in politics or in the arena of public service. (His record as an entrepreneur seems highly dubious). Indeed, he doesn't seem to have any understanding of the way most people live or to understand basic human empathy. It seems to me that Trump suffers from dementia or some kind of cognitive deterioration, although I doubt he ever had very much intellectual prowess.

Regarding G.W. Bush, I don't think your timeline is quite right. The Iraq War only started in 2003, more than halfway through his first term. Bush was still riding a high approval rating for his response to 9/11. The Iraq War only became unpopular during Bush's second term and eventually contributed to a high disapproval rating, although the crashing real estate market didn't help. The economy was reeling by the time Obama took office. And, indeed, the pendulum swung far after Bush's second term on Obama's campaign of "hope and change." America was very ready for change after Bush.

Fast forward to the present day and we see a very different political climate. The pendulum has swung very far back in a neoconservative direction, only today's neoconservative is very different from the GW Bush variety. Americans are very polarized and Trump has inserted himself into this divide, fanning the flames to energize his very devoted and anti-intellectual base. The Republicans are waging a scorched earth campaign, getting what they can, while they can. But they do so without a trace of a Reagan conservative's traditional values. Today's Republicans are morally bankrupt, beholden to corporate interests, perfectly willing to endorse a sexual molester only to keep their majority in Congress. But their time is running short. Trump already has some of the lowest approval ratings of any president in recent history. It currently stands at about 33 percent, while the average is above 50 percent. By 2020, I think we will certainly see the pendulum swinging the other way.

[LanDroid]

Regarding G.W. Bush, I don't think your timeline is quite right. The Iraq War only started in 2003, more than halfway through his first term. Bush was still riding a high approval rating for his response to 9/11. The Iraq War only became unpopular during Bush's second term and eventually contributed to a high disapproval rating, although the crashing real estate market didn't help.

Gotta disagree on that. The war started in March 2003 and was predicted to be a quick victory with Saddam gone, huge stockpiles of WMD found, peace in Iraq, and a statue to President Bush erected in Baghdad expressing the thanks of the Iraqi people. Bush's incompetent war planning provided far too few US troops and expected them out of Iraq by August or certainly by the end of 2003. Sec Def Rumsfeld even threatened to fire anyone planning for Iraq nation building. After the invasion came many horrendous decisions such as firing all Iraq police and military personnel who were affiliated with Saddam. With little security, very soon the car bombs and mosque attacks started which continue to this day. Eighteen months later by election time 2004 it was obvious the war was a rolling disaster and we should not have pulled resources out of Afghanistan. When Bush won, jaws dropped and eyes widened all over the planet.

Trump has done nothing to sink to anywhere near that level. He may yet do far worse, but let's stop the talk of rehabbing Bush's image.

[Taylor]

"In Trump We Trust"

Sitting here reading the most recent contributions to this thread... I think I've imagined Trumps 2020 campaign slogan.
Trump is the culmination of decades of work by 'Free Market Fundamentalist'. These are people for whom uninhibited self interest is directly related to the mental disorder of Ayn Rand style economic materialism added to heavy doses of social Darwinism. They worship at the altar of Adam Smith's [Wealth of Nations] but ignore completely Smith's own buffer to that unrestricted capitalism.

"The Theory of Moral Sentiments" published long before [WoN] asked humanity to be sympathetic towards one another, to put ourselves in the circumstance of others, not to seek public approbation but merely to diminish suffering in others. He warns against frivolous desires (materialism) and instead asks for a system of benevolence.

Lately I found that the people who reject Neo-Darwinism most forcefully are in fact Social Darwinism's strongest advocates. They imply by action of uninhibited self-interest that global warming is not a problem, this is how they institute Muslim bans. By preventing emigration you deny Anthropogenic Global Warming and by extension poverty. By unleashing the power of coal they deny the devastating effects of pollution.

The free market fundamentalist is insidious to the environment outside accumulation of personal wealth, They reject the progressive nature of their own; such as Abraham Lincoln and Theodor Roosevelt. Free market fundies are still engaged in the federalist debate. Ronald Reagan was the grand puba of free market fundies. This is why he is such a hero to the current crop of conservative materialist social Darwinist we see and hear from. These people proffer the false notion that unrestricted markets offer all solutions and in their thinking...If it ain't being solved, it ain't a problem we should be concerned about. In their minds market futures are the ultimate crystal ball.

Free Market Fundies strangely reject any and all science that contradicts the rapid accumulation of wealth while at same time pretending to participate in the development of those scientific ventures... they are odd, cherry picking cohorts...when they cannot refute the science they attack the scientist. (climate gate comes to mind).

Young Earth Creationist and Free Market Fundamentalist are not strange bedfellows, They are the new ruling class. Together they have sickened and soured a vast number of people into a state apathy...added to the downside of apathy as being a preexisting condition of the general public. I ask...Is the virtue of learning for learning sake a modern era phenomenon? not in my opinion. The failure of people to follow the logic of their own thoughts is a dismal reality today. Neo-con free market fundies lament the era of the low information voter while at same time contributing to the dumbing down that is so very evident.

[Harry Marks]

Right now it looks to this economist like the economy is likely to look pretty good in 2020. Republicans will claim the tax cut is responsible, but it isn't, except in the same Keynesian sense that spending would also have stimulated the economy. Unemployment of 4% is supposed to mean that inflation will follow stimulus, but I have a strong feeling that extra income will mean extra production, and that the economy actually has a lot of growth in it without needing to start up inflation. (Although when you look at the UK, with a smaller overall economy, the current inflation rate casts some doubt on my sense of where we are.)

The tax cut will drive up the dollar. Look out debtor countries. And the trade deficit will grow as much as it did from the Reagan tax cuts (doubled, as a percent of GDP, which about matches the forecasts by macroeconomists), which will allow Trump to sow even more seeds of long-term damage by undoing trade agreements.

[geo]

Gotta disagree on that. The war started in March 2003 and was predicted to be a quick victory with Saddam gone, huge stockpiles of WMD found, peace in Iraq, and a statue to President Bush erected in Baghdad expressing the thanks of the Iraqi people.

The war was a fiasco and I forgot how close Bush's reelection was. Bush actually lost the popular vote the first time around, but against John Kerry he won the popular vote by the slimmest of margins. I still say that it took time for Bush's approval rating to drop. Indeed, the Iraq War was seen as a success at first.

from Wikipedia:

. . . on May 1, George W. Bush landed on the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, in a Lockheed S-3 Viking, where he gave a speech announcing the end of "major combat operations" in the Iraq War. Bush's approval rating in May was at 66%, according to a CNN–USA Today–Gallup poll.[7] However, Bush's high approval ratings did not last. First, while the war itself was popular in the U.S., the reconstruction and attempted "democratization" of Iraq lost some support as months passed and casualty figures increased, with no decrease in violence nor progress toward stability or reconstruction. Second, as investigators combed through the country, they failed to find the predicted WMD stockpiles, which led to debate over the rationale for the war.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Bush

And here's a graph showing the trend of his approval rating through both of his terms.



https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=ht ... EQ9QEILTAA

The Iraq War is a perfect example of broken U.S. foreign policy. But you can probably make the argument that Bush at least wanted to do what was right for America. If not a very good president, at least a good person. I have softened my stance towards the man in recent years. But I still would say the war in Iraq was a huge, costly mistake, borne or hubris and political malfeasance, a disgrace really.