I’ve been chewing on a blog post for about two weeks that takes on where we are now. It’s churning the way a slice of cheap freezer-style pizza with fake pepperoni churns at 3am and you can’t find the antacid because it’s still too dark to see.
What kills me most is that The Trump Show has become a weekly reality nightmare. At the same time, the failure of a GOP-led Congress has been in session straight up trying to tear down the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) for so long they’ve nearly run the clock out on the budget process. Tax code is nothing without a budget. We’re still operating on a continuing resolution. We’ve been without an actual budget for well over five years, as the GOP have continued to kick that can down the street, denying any sort of progress out of fear that the electorate will like the progress and stop voting for them.
We’ll hit the debt ceiling soon, and I suspect they’re going to miss the deadline. The GOP are not going to get a budget passed without doing massive damage to our existing infrastructure. Seriously. We’re heading for something we haven’t seen since around 2008, when the housing bubble burst.
In Trump’s mind, his audience is far larger than just the people who came to watch the inauguration, remember? His narcissistic view of his own popularity is continuing to get in the way of the GOP agenda. After his failure regarding Wealthcare, I suspect forcing him to sign sanctions against Russia may just be the key to a full-on fascist meltdown. So what does he do? He takes a 17-day vacation. What else can he do? The Senate has already made it clear there will be no recess appointments. Senator Murkowski (R-AK) has declared nine Pro Forma sessions. Sessions declared to keep Sessions in place.
See what I did there? No? Sigh. Moving on.
Trouble is, Trump’s base are impervious to reality as we view it. They believe that anything that interferes with Trump’s world view is a lie. Nobody can convince them otherwise. Not only that, but Trump has his own version of Reality TV, having moved past Fox News and straight to the Ministry of Truth.
They’re starting to turn away from Fox as too liberal. Think about that.
Unless you’ve been under a rock, you know Mueller’s impaneled a Grand Jury. Sooner or later, Trump will have to relinquish power. I suspect he’d rather die first. In the majority of his adult life nobody’s told him he’s fired. He won’t know how to step down. If Wealthcare was any indication, we’re screwed, and the GOP will have nobody to blame but themselves. Of course, they’ll try to pin it all on Democrats.
Meanwhile, I work at a place that supports families in the DC region and I have kids in public schools. Nobody knows what September is going to look like, let alone October.
It’s not possible to stop the U.S. economy on a dime. It took months for the real impact of the Great Depression to be felt, and years to undo the damage.
It’s truly scary to think we’re where we are, only seven months in.