Trump Insecurities Hit Peak
Taken at face value President Biden’s comments are clear. He is set to deprive former President Trump of his daily intelligence briefings – briefings afforded to every previous President – on the grounds he’s “too erratic” and may abuse this privilege, presumably by speaking about the contents.
As expected this news was met with almost universal approval from leading commentators across mainstream media outlets. Not a moment was given to consider any possible future and wider implications of the proposed action or even if it the proposed action best serves the problem identified. The logic seems to be that because Trump is deemed bad any move that can further limit his capacity in any official sense must be good.
Hallelujah. The world is saved folks. Or is it? I think such a move by President Biden would be a huge own goal and a gift to Team Trump’s future political ambitions. Further, I think it shows just how insecure Democrats are about Trump. An insecurity that is blinding judgement and distracting from the business of Governing at a crucial time. Something that almost certainly will come back to bite them.
Yes, Trump is erratic. He’s also been President for four years and has seen mountains of intelligence. He can’t simply forget that. He’s got plenty to talk about of a sensitive nature, which makes Biden’s main argument to justify any move to stop briefings – that he might talk about things he sees and shouldn’t – utterly lacking in substance.
There is evidence too that Trump is far from the risk the new administration would like to paint him as. The most notable that springs to mind relates to the events surrounding the killing of General Suleimani of Iran. While few doubted Suleimani’s guilt in helping to destabilise the Middle East, engaging directly and indirectly in support of groups who were killing or had killed American troops, the strike was widely condemned. Many perceived it as a reckless act of aggression in the region and some went further, accusing Trump of actively trying to risk an all-out conflict with Iran. CNN was clear that Trump had created an immediate crisis where there was none.
What was largely overlooked at the time was Trump’s response to the Iranian missile attack on the US base in response. He downplayed it claiming in the immediate aftermath that no servicemen or women had been killed or injured. Weeks later it would emerge that in-fact as many as 50 were injured with 18 been moved for further treatment and evaluation in Germany.
It is impossible to argue that Trump was unaware of the casualties. Far more likely, is that he chose to downplay the attack to avoid any demands for retaliation they could have provoked. He was disarming the situation and using intelligence responsibly. The President of ‘America first’ knew all too well what could have been demanded had he made note of the casualties at the time. A very dangerous series of events may have become set in motion.
On the charge he is irresponsible with intelligence and a risk to receive future briefings the evidence just isn’t there.
Moving on, if the argument to justify removing the briefing is weak then the logic of it seems totally at odds with the problem identified. By choosing not to extend to Trump the same privilege enjoyed by all other living Presidents, effectively expelling him from the club, it is hard to see how this is meant to help manage the problem of his erratic behaviour. Far from it, this act seems designed to do just the opposite and poke the bear. How can Biden claim this will reduce the risk he has identified?
Nor does this act hardly say much for Biden’s unity pitch either. How can you claim to want unity in a nation when one of your first acts is to deny the former President a privilege afforded to every other living President before him? Unity through exceptional treatment?
The act also fails the very American values Joe Biden claims to champion. To deny Trump a privilege on the grounds of what he might do is at odds with the presumption of innocent until proven guilty. About as sacred a principal there is in American society.
It is also bad politics. By refusing Trump the briefings, he affords Trump a free hit ,or even several, to enjoy at Biden’s expense in the future. Trump could quite easily intervene on any number of sensitive subjects and he can plead ignorance. Without the briefings how can he know? Any controversy or outdated claims he can leave firmly at Biden’s door. “Had I seen the briefings I may not have felt the need to comment or I certainly would have chosen different words”. A problem of Biden’s own making. Free publicity for Trump the candidate / team.
By reverse if Biden continued to provide Trump the briefings he could control him more. If he were to speak out in the way Biden suggests is a risk, then it is infinitely easier to manage. By being ‘in the club’ it is harder for him to speak out in any way. “He gets the same intelligence as me and the other former Presidents. Maybe he just doesn’t read it”. It makes it harder, not easier, for him to speak out or even choose when to.
Why then has President Biden decided to declare his intention and presumably act upon it?
The Democratic Party and President Biden’s obsession with Trump has a simple explanation. His popularity remains both real and an enigma. And they plan to use any means possible to seek to damage him as a candidate. I don’t think it can work. How can it? Voters have priced in Trump and his nature long ago. Trying to use more official ways of labelling him as ‘bad’ won’t suddenly cut through, especially now he’s out of office.
There is still no settled understanding in the Democratic party that can explain how the joke candidate became President and did so despite all the personal stories, scandals, shared views and a whole litany of other factors that would have sunk the aspirations of any other candidate long before they could even be called a ‘campaign’. There is less still about how he went on to add 11 million more votes than in 2016 and who they came from.
Trump remains a real and present danger to Democrat prospects in 2024. That’s what this is all about. While they wouldn’t admit it publicly they must recognise their election success owed more to luck than judgement and, as the Time article this week admits, some help from powerful friends seeking to ‘do good’ in what media voters could consume during the campaign.
The election victory for Biden was anything but the triumph they want you to believe. There was no landslide. No outright rejection of Trump. Yes, Biden won more votes than any candidate in history. But Trump secured the second most votes in history of any candidate and the highest of any incumbent.
There was a ‘Blue Wave’ that did come to the rescue, but it didn’t sweep away all before it as was predicted. Instead it was largely cancelled out by a ‘Red Wave’ that no one in the established political and media class predicted. Trump lost, yes. But not in such a way that confines him to history.
Don’t believe me that it was more luck than judgement? A year ago, the odds of Trump winning re-election were as high as 64%.
Despite a Presidential approval rating persistently in the low 40s it was the unemployment rate, and its continued decline to a historic 3% level nationally, that suggested Trump would have a huge tailwind if it continued. Indeed, the economic indicators would normally be associated with Presidential approval ratings up to 20 points higher.
Then we know what happened next. With the arrival of the Coronavirus Trump went from a favourite for re-election to the predicted loser in a landslide ‘Blue Wave’ in a matter of months.
The Democrats played their hand well of course. The pandemic offered a new way to frame Trump as incompetent and dangerous to ordinary citizens. A narrative Trump himself seemed to be determined to help foster with his press briefings and media comments. Who can forget his insights on bleach or the use of ultra-violet light?
They successfully painted Trump as being uniquely incompetent even though the facts said the US experience of Coronavirus was comparable to other major Western nations such as the UK, France and Italy, and despite the power to manage the day to day pandemic being largely passed to State Governors while the federal government focused on Operation Warp Speed (OWS).
Make no mistake about it, OWS is a resounding success. A stupendous one in-fact. Yes, lots of money was thrown at a problem and some people have personally benefitted significantly from that. The same is true of PPE procurement in the US or any other nation. Just get it done. The costs are frankly dwarfed by those we will avoid each day we can return to normality sooner. Just as the UK government didn’t seek to haggle on the price of vaccines and delay their ultimate delivery, OWS did much the same for kickstarting vaccine development and the building the necessary production capacity to deliver them at scale and speed.
OWS has transformed not just US prospects in defeating Covid-19 but global ones too. When all is said and done after this Pandemic it will be OWS that is singled out more for its contribution than any other initiative. As this article below makes clear, it will be seen as defining success. A genuine positive contribution to the ending of the pandemic and it was on Trump’s watch that it came to pass. The credit due is real.
“The U.S. is on track to produce more than 100 million doses of coronavirus vaccines, manufactured by multiple companies, by the end of the year, he says, and by Inauguration Day, “the vast, vast majority of the heavy lifting will be behind us.”
This reality is why the need to somehow once and for all tarnish Trump is so necessary. It will be vaccines developed by Trump’s OWS that will end this pandemic. Not face-masks and kind words. Voters will come to know this. Vaccine development in rapid timescales didn’t happen by accident. The Federal Government, private businesses and multiple agencies coordinated with military precision.
In time then, there is a very real chance the perception of Trump and the pandemic may change significantly in his favour. Voters may then consider their pre-covid lives too under that erratic President too. The one who was favourite win.
The one under which by many traditional measures America was ‘winning’. Stock market highs, record low unemployment, taking on China at last and striking out in robust but proportionate ways against those who wish to see it come to harm. Yes, the Commander and Chief was Trump, but the KPIs were looking good.
The simple truth is that once the pandemic ends the Democrats still need to find a way to beat Trump in a normal election. That it was only extraordinary circumstances that came to their rescue in 2020 tells you everything about their insecurities today. They’ll try anything.
That said. Perhaps I’m wrong. Perhaps this move by President Biden heralds a new era of bi-partisanship. After all, on the matter of intelligence briefings at least, here is a Government entitlement the Democrats actually want to cut. Talk about reaching out to Republicans.
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