This is a free preview of what you’ll get from the Resolute Insider, our subscriber-only newsletter provided to Resolute Square Members. Click here to learn about the great benefits of membership.
They, like so many others, refuse to believe that the inmates run the asylum, and Trump is RP McMurphy with the Ultra MAGAs serving as Nurse Ratched, keeping everyone in line. They’re different breeds of the same authoritarian cats.
Last week, the Red Wave failed to break and angry Republican elites went looking for someone to blame. The biggest mongrel elephant in the room, Donald Trump, serves as a convenient target given his leadership and control of the party. They’re shouting that his insistence on calling the 2020 election stolen, and only supporting #UltraMAGA candidates in primaries cost the party dearly.
To stave off any early challenges, on Tuesday night, Low Energy Donald sleep-walked through his latest ‘avenues of blood’ speech announcing his fourth bid for the presidency. [NOTE: He briefly ran on the Reform Party ticket in 2000 - it counts.] His staff didn’t want him to announce so closely on the heels of the mid-term deflation. His favorite child is sitting this one out. No word yet on Slenderman - though one would expect his Saudi patrons to ‘encourage’ his participation in the campaign.
DC power brokers, too long at the mercy of Trump and minions, want to wash their hands of him. Oligarchical billionaire donors are over him, too. They want their power, money and Washington-based marionettes firmly back in their yards. These are the same guys that tell you they liked “Trump’s policies” but never really like him or his Tweets.
Bullshit.
The national media, meanwhile, is, right on cue, desperate for a conservative crackup to boost viewership and ad revenue as another long, contentious campaign season comes to an end. Trump is always good for ratings, even if he’s not good for the country. The likes of Glenn Yougkin (lives in Horse Country and wears a vest!) and Ron DeSantis (such credentials!) are ‘acceptable’ enough for this argument.
All of them: The donors, the conservative intelligentsia, such as it is, the consultants and the potential 2024 Republican candidates have had it with Trump. Was it inciting an insurrection on January 6th? No, sir. Was it blackmailing Ukraine? No. His disastrous and deadly response to Covid? Not that. The overt ugliness, racism, incompetence, and corruption? Nope.
What did The Donald do that was so awful? He cost them power in Washington, DC and state capitals around the country. Not one of them has discussed Trump’s dismantling of any Republican ideology nor his pure unfitness for office. They’re pissed off because he made their lives harder.
Kevin McCarthy, the Trump simp-in-chief, will have to give up all his power - to Trump-supporting MAGA Members of Congress, to wield a flaccid Speaker’s gavel. But he’ll do it. Mitch McConnell was ready to get back to the ‘business of the Senate’ and put the adults back in charge.
Trump’s America First movement is a case-study in revanchist nihilism. But the Establishment Republican Party is no better. They don’t care about anything other than ‘tax cuts’ for their wealthy benefactors and being in charge of things. He cost them the ability to act in the same sort of self-interested behavior that Trump himself has perfected.
Let us turn briefly to all the saviors waiting in the wings. During the 2022 campaign, did Golden Tater Tot DeSantis, Youngkin, Mike Pence, or Mike Pompeo stand on principle and campaign for non-MAGA candidates in primaries? No. They didn’t go to barricades to defend Reps. Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger for defending the Constitution and the rule of law.
In fact, they all, and many ‘normal’ Republicans, campaigned eagerly, avidly, and often for the likes of anti-Semite, Confederate Doug Mastriano, Adam ‘Who’s Your Daddy’ Laxalt, and Kari Lake and her vacuum cleaner. Take a step back - Trump serves as the easiest target, but also the biggest figure that can spread an eclipse over their own bad behavior.
These people have all sat at the table with the Camp Auschwitz guy. They’ve funded the Proud Boys’ pre-riot keggers. They did it because, in the interest of their own current and future ambitions, they know they need Trump’s base to have any shot in a presidential primary. As with so much in the Trump era, he reveals the weakness and fecklessness in those who ride in his wake.
The inmates run the GOP asylum. The Establishment, once again, doesn’t understand that they’re stuck in the institution with the kooks and goons. Trump is happy to play Nurse Ratched to their RP McMurphys. We know how this ends.
