What I have said very publicly is that Democrats need to play possum. This whole thing is collapsing. It doesn’t need Elizabeth Warren and somebody screaming to pacify some progressive advocacy groups in Washington, which, by the way, I wish these people were just useless. They’re actually worse than useless, that they’re detrimental. And they never, ever learn to shut up. And so then this is what I believe. I believe that this administration, in less than 30 days is in the midst of a massive collapse and particularly a collapse in public opinion.The conversation continued:
“It’s going to be easy pickings here in six weeks,” [Carville] said of opportunities for Democrats. “Just lay back.”Today is Day 30 -- the thirtieth day following that pronouncement. Here are Trump's job approval numbers in the polling averages:
Abrams asked, “You literally think 30 days to six weeks, the Trump administration is effectively going to collapse in terms of public support?
Carville predicted Trump would find it impossible to pass any agenda items and that House Speaker Mike Johnson would be forced to reach across the aisle to ask House Democrats for help.
“We’re in the midst of a collapse,” Carville said. “It’s over.”
* Nate Silver: approval 47.5%, disapproval 49.6% (-2.1)The numbers aren't great, but that's not a collapse. And Mike Johnson was able to line up the votes for a continuing budget resolution, which Senate Democrats led by Chuck Schumer failed to block.
* RealClearPolling: approval 47.9%, disapproval 48.8% (-0.9)
* G. Elliott Morris, Silver's successor at FiveThirtyEight: approval 47.5%, disapproval 48.8% (-1.3)
*VoteHub: approval 47.7%, disapproval 48.6% (-0.9)
"Playing possum" isn't working.
But the courts will save us -- right? That's what we're being told by J. Michael Luttig in The New York Times:
Luttig is, of course, a former federal judge who was appointed by President George H.W. Bush; he's a Donald Trump critic and a frequent guest on MSNBC. In paragraph 4 of his op-ed, he says: Just you wait, Mr. President -- the courts are coming for you.
But unless Mr. Trump immediately turns an about-face and beats a fast retreat, not only will he plunge the nation deeper into constitutional crisis, which he appears fully willing to do, he will also find himself increasingly hobbled even before his already vanishing political honeymoon is over.(The reference to Trump's "already vanishing political honeymoon" suggests that Luttig believes James Carville was right thirty days ago.)
So how will Trump be "hobbled"? Five paragraphs later, Luttig tells us the hobbling began after Trump defied district court judge James Boasberg and called for his impeachment:
Within hours, the tectonic plates of the constitutional order shifted beneath Mr. Trump’s feet. The chief justice of the United States, John G. Roberts Jr. — the head of the third branch of government — rebuked the president in a rare missive. “For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision,” the chief justice instructed.The constutional tectonic plates may have shifted under Trump's feet, but Trump clearly kept his balance. Luttig writes:
Unbowed, Mr. Trump laced into Judge Boasberg the next day on his Truth Social platform....So maybe that wasn't much of a tremor?
Four paragraphs later, Luttig tells us:
Mr. Trump seems supremely confident, though deludedly so, that he can win this war against the federal judiciary, just as he was deludedly confident that he could win the war he instigated against America’s democracy after the 2020 election.Some would argue that it was a long war against American democracy, and Trump actually won it. After all, he's president now.
But Luttig tells us Trump is "deluded" if he thinks "he can win this war against the federal judiciary." So what will happen to Trump? Finally, after four more paragraphs that fail to answer this question, we learn what fate awaits Trump, according to Luttig. I hope you're sitting down:
If the president oversteps his authority in his dispute with Judge Boasberg, the Supreme Court will step in and assert its undisputed constitutional power “to say what the law is.” A rebuke from the nation’s highest court in his wished-for war with the nation’s federal courts could well cripple Mr. Trump’s presidency and tarnish his legacy.That's it? "A rebuke from the nation’s highest court"? That's going to "cripple Mr. Trump’s presidency"? How?
Luttig has nothing. The only way to understand this is to assume that the constitutional crisis will be the rebuke to Trump -- that Trump will feel so ashamed at being rebuked that he'll comply, or that he'll stir sleeping giants, as Luttig says elsewhere in the op-ed:
If Mr. Trump continues to attempt to usurp the authority of the courts, the battle will be joined, and it will be up to the Supreme Court, Congress and the American people to step forward and say: Enough.People might rise up -- many people are rising up now -- but who listens to us when what we want conflicts with what powerful people want? And a Republican Congress will never rise up.
And will the Supreme Court even respond the way Luttig assumes it will? Elie Mystal doesn't think so. He expects just the opposite, and he thinks the statement John Roberts issued this week wasn't a rebuke at all:
It may sound like Roberts was saying that Trump should litigate his disagreements with Judge Boasberg in the normal way, but what he’s really saying is that Trump should feel free to ignore lower-court orders until the Supreme Court has a chance to weigh in....The system won't save us. Chuck Schumer, on Meet the Press this morning, said explicitly that it's our job to do the fighting, not his job or his colleagues' job:
Roberts is trying to maintain the appearance of power in the face of a president who has shown no inclination to respect it. He is trying, desperately, to avoid a judicial confrontation with Trump, while still wanting to sound like he is in control....
Trump is not going to follow a Supreme Court order he doesn’t like, and everybody paying attention knows that, including Roberts. The only way for Roberts to avoid being exposed by Trump as unimportant is to defer to Trump on any matter of real import.
Roberts will undoubtedly ... admonish Trump for his process of ignoring the law, but ultimately rule that the laws Trump won’t follow anyway are unconstitutional. He knows Trump will violate his orders, so his entire plan will be to not issue an order that Trump can violate.
... But if the public is so, so angry and takes action, and certainly we Democrats will, it will trigger a mass movement from one end of the country to the other, something that we haven't seen in a very long time.So our leaders won't lead. We have to be the leaders. Thanks for nothing, Chuck.
