Imho, here's the scary thing.

[hollodero]

(12-23-2019, 07:16 PM)Dill Wrote: Well I think you cannot say it's getting easier by the day if "saying whatever" before a bewildered public has finally lost the GOP the House and enabled a vote to impeach.

Sure, that is true. It wasn't necessarily successful, all in all, doesn't mean it got more difficult. I just meant that in former times, one could watch someone like Sean Spicer hanging himself on a daily basis trying to be somewhat factual still. A Kellyanne never cared about that. And her style has won the day now, no one cares any longer. Just attack CNN if you find no rebuttal, that's good enough for your side and the other side is bewildered anyways. And yeah it seems to get easier by the day to use that tactic. Albeit there might be some losses applied to it (which can be seen that way, though I rather don't).
As for midterm wins, I'd caution a bit because the way I see it, a) the opposition always wins and b) these wins, as I'm told, had more to do with issues like health care and not so much with fear of authoritarianism or disgust about all the presidential lies, smears and radicalizations finally boiling over.

Turning the senate around, that would have been a real win. Everything less is too little, imho.

(12-23-2019, 07:16 PM)Dill Wrote: Had Trump never tweeted and listened to his better advisors, his approval might be over 50% per cent now and the election locked.

Yeah that's probably true. If he were a bit smarter, a bit more tactical, a bit more restrained, he could be way more successful. It's why I'd say, yeah maybe Trump is not the one to rise to a de facto-dictatorship, bluntly he's too stupid for that. I'm also worried about the next guy though, the one that watched and learned.
For the way I see it, just by being so blunt and resistant to advice, Trump stumbled over the possibilities he actually has. Others thought there's things you just cannot possibly say or do or you'd lose all political support. Turns out you can say and do quite a lot of formerly unthinkable things and don't lose any political support, as long as propaganda tool + uncritical mass is behind you no matter what. That is probably new information, and be it just because others listened to advisors and hence no one dared to go there before.

(12-23-2019, 07:16 PM)Dill Wrote: To rephrase what I said above, to CENTER the GOP's power in Trump's unethical and incompetent person of Trump--which is what we see happening now--increases both his accountability and his party's by reducing the number of people who can be blamed for errors, and increasing the number who can be blamed for kow towing to bad judgment.

Yeah, but accountable to whom? Blamed by whom?

To use a slightly exaggerated and unreal example, Trump shoots Comey (I let Comey survive, I'm not that sick). Now the hardcore supporters would probably cheer more than anything, and they would just claim how Hillary shot Seth Rich and killed americans in Benghazi and dozens of other people and how liberals did not have a problem with that. As for the somewhat less extreme microcosm here, I'm pretty sure Dino or anyone would make a thread about it, saying "Trump is now shooting people on the streets and the rubes have no issue with that". Then someone would accuse him of being hyperbolic, after all he just shot only one person, so why say "people", also Comey was not an angel and we all should stop pretending that he was. And by saying "rubes" Dino is a typical example of the left shooting itself in the foot, also he's a bit deranged. Doesn't sound too far off, does it. And maybe in the end, there might be some annoyed admission that OF COURSE Trump should not shoot people, just as OF COURSE liberals should not act as if he just started WW3, and both sides are to blame for the increased extremism, so what gives. And one still wants a conservative SC justice.

That's the dynamic, isn't it? It always was, through some quite unspeakable presidential misdeeds. And still there was no major breaking away of support.

And sure in the bigger picture, the house is democratic now and he got impeached. But as of now, I am not sure if that matters.

(12-23-2019, 07:16 PM)Dill Wrote: E.g., suppose it is Trump's judgment, not McConnell's, that finally determines whether the Senate trial will call witnesses and introduce primary documents, and that while Rudy and the DOJ are working disable Trump opponents. That makes it pretty clear to real independents how 1) power formerly distributed across the party has now become wholly concentrated in one man with the power to punish, and 2) how that concentration undoes the autonomy of institutions like the Senate and the DOJ, eliminating their independent power to check.

Yeah, one would think that. I just want to counter that by questioning the power of true independents. They did not really turn the last presidential election around. And though the data points regarding Trump were different ones, it's not like it wasn't totally clear what kind of person he is and what kind of leadership idea he brings with him.
The electorate, as a whole, went with someone known for being narcissistic, dishonest, indecent, racially insensitive (to put it way too mildly), running fraudulent universities and charities, extort tax payers, etc. etc. Now they know some additional things, but why will these change the outcome if the former things could not.

(12-23-2019, 07:16 PM)Dill Wrote: You are quite right to see in the tendency to craven submission an enabling of authoritarian power, and to see that it is increasing within the party. But I think it wrong to suppose all this has no counter effect, does not create a number of resistance points both within and without both party and government.  All GOP voters are not going along with this

Yeah that's my problem, I do not see those resistance points really. Sure, on the fringe there are. And there were lots of cheers for every conservative breaking away, be it Amash or known conservatives --- Scarborough or I don't know all the names, Michael Steele, Steve Schmidt? --- or quite some others. These then go to the networks and slam Trump and the GOP to the cheers of the liberals (and mine, they have quite the strong points), but I don't really see a moving needle attached to that.
I do see little movement (or chance) to turn over the senate, because in the end the GOP voters seem to go along, they almost voted for a Roy Moore even - and the senate is the crucial chamber the way I see it. Controlling 50+ senators (controlling them through the means and mechanisms I described and believe to be true) would be the clear pathway to authoritarianism. Never mind the house, they can not really block anything or hold someone accountable if the senate is firm. Maybe I'm wrong about that, but it seems that's the key. And this key remains in Trump's hands.