Trump Watch

When Do We Know It’s Bad?

I'm still not ready. I've done warm baths, therapy, distracting myself with video games, and drinking (a whole lot of drinking), and I'm still not ready to bear President Trump. I'm getting there. I don't avert my eyes from the TV when he's on anymore. (Though many close to me still do.) I even read some the news. I was just hoping I had more time, but everything is moving too fast.

Let's face it. You want me to talk about it. You want me to make some kind of estimate on how bad it will get. More importantly, you want to know when to apply for that Canadian visa (assuming we are not at war with them. Remember that they'll pick Australia's side over us.)

So, the way I see it, we are talking about three potential outcomes to watch for.

1. A Disaster Presidency
2. Amazing to most of us, a Successful Presidency
3. Democratic progress is threatened, a Threatening Presidency.

Hopefully, I can maintain an updated guess on each of these and more important what will be the "tipping points" as in what to watch for.

The Disaster Presidency

I would define this as overrun with corruption and incompetence, an unnecessary international crisis or war, or massive economic hardship. This would include a financial crisis, suffering from changes to health care, an epidemic of riots, etc.

What helps is that there are previous examples of disaster presidencies. Examples are Grant, Harding, Nixon, and G.W. Bush. (Some would include Carter in this list as well, but you see the point.) However, in theses examples, three were re-elected. All have historian defenders, Even now, you will meet resistance criticizing Nixon and Bush. That is because there is some subjectivity (that war was totally necessary) and relativity (your president was more corrupt).

Whatever, the case, we will not get a consensus until long after we have passed on. Maybe not even then. However, we can get a majority. One of the best measures is (What's it called? Oh yeah.) elections, but we see how inaccurate the last one was. There are also approval ratings. Yeah I know we just had problems with polling as well. Perhaps the best measure in Congress.

Even if the presidency is broiled in disaster nothing will happen before 2020, unless Congress allows it. As of now, the bet is 'no', but that can change. And that is the real question, what will change it? Quite simply when will the majority of senators and representatives believe Trump is more harm to them than good. Simply put, would 218 representatives and 60 senators believe they must stop him to be re-elected

Counting representatives is too cumbersome and complicated, so instead, as a proxy, let's count the minimum senators that would never take power from him. If the count is comfortably bellow 60, he's safe. 60 or above he's on thin ice. 67 or above, he's one mistake away from impeachment.

My eyeball guess is 36. I'll get into this more in a future post.

Off the top of my head, tipping points include

•  Conservative media no longer supports him
•  Approval ratings drops bellow 35%
•  Major republicans change parties

The Successful Presidency

Hey, who knows. I and about half the country could be wrong. Again, though, just like the Disaster Presidency, there will always be those who insists it's a success even as Russian soldiers are landing on our shores. So, we are back to using Congress again. Here I would count the number of senators that will vote for his initiatives no matter what. Bellow 50, times will be difficult for him. Above 60, he's only limited by his competency. My eyeball guess is 49. I'll get into this more in a future post.

A point to remember is that a Successful Presidency is not necessarily a republican success. There are a lot of scenarios where the Trump Presidency is remembered for progressive accomplishments (raising minimum wage, expansion of Medicare, return of unions, etc.) In fact, for reasons I'll go into later, success will most likely be a bipartisan success.

Off the top of my head, tipping points include

• Approval ratings goes above 50%
• New political candidates begin to imitate President Trump
• Political parties restructure or new one forms

The Threatening Presidency

Note that during the election, I had looked at his' threat to democracy', while here I instead refer to 'democratic progress'. The difference is that 'threat to democracy' would describe changes that have no parallel in American history and would have a bipartisan agreement. But, that's a tall order.

America was less 'democratic' than toady, and we don't want that to return to then. I avoided describing the threat that way during the election because there's no bipartisan way to do so. My hope is that I can outline both conservative threats (such as permanent government takeover of businesses) and liberal threats (such as overt voter suppression), even if done separately. I'm looking for scenarios where at least one side would hate and the other would not like (or admit to liking). Good examples are internment camps and the return of Jim Crow. And of course, this would include out and out threats to democracy.

Long term effect is important here. In truth, I am more concerned about the President that follows Trump. And by the converse, my concern is less for action easily undone by the next president.

So how do we rank the chances and what are the tipping points

Off the top of my head, tipping points include

• Approval ratings goes above 50%
• New political candidates begin to imitate President Trump
• Political parties restructure or new one forms
• Governors commit constitutional abuses and the Federal Government does not stop it
• Judge rulings are ignored with no consequences
• Major news media outlets are closed with no pushback
• Militia groups are allowed to commit violence with no real effort to stop them

If some of those are the same as a Successful Presidency, yeah that's the case. He has to be perceived successful to be a threat (otherwise, he's just a disaster). So you can think of a Threatening Presidency as a Successful Presidency Plus.

As for ranking the likelihood, I still can't come up with an objective measure. The closest I know of is the Doomsday Clock, but that is a subjective one. For now, I'll have to be subjective and just try the following.

In order to be threatening, President Trump has to meet three thresholds. Has to be willing to make an attempt. He has to be competent enough to succeed. And, none of our 'checks and balances' would stop him. I'll rank each of these as Very Low, Low, Medium, High, and Very High. Here are my first guesses.

• Attempt: Medium
• Competence: Low
• No Check: High

Since all thresholds would have to be met, the overall rank is the lowest of all three. So, Low. 'll get into this more in (you guessed it) a future post