Trump, Going Rogue, Hanging On

THE SUPREME COURT made the obvious ruling, the only ruling which would have made sense. Only Congress has the power, according to the constitution, to make tariff policy. The president does not. And its as simple as that. No matter how heavily the Republicans pack SCOTUS with sycophantic far right wing Trump supporters, even an extremist, skewed right wing court has the good sense to abide by the constitution. They could put nine John Birchers or nine Anthony Scalia's on the court, and some of the decisions, like this one, would still come out the same. And of course Trump, with typical very young childish mentality and emotional immaturity, lashed out at the high court, dirtying up the situation with his usual vitriolic spew. The constitution is so clear that tariff policy, like interstate commerce, is strictly under the control of Congress, that, as usual, there shouldn't even be any discussion of it. It should be, and is, a slam dunk, as they say. Trump trying to usurp the power of Congress and gather unto himself powers of government which properly, clearly belong in the hands of others, has been a Trump pattern of behavior from the very beginning, from the very first day of his administration, when, as you might recall, he began the day by issuing an illegal executive order changing the constiturion, rescinding birthright citizenship, which was instituted by constitutional amendment in 1866. Arbitrarily, unilateraly making laws out of whole cloth, declaring emergenies for no reason other than to grab power illegally, ignoring any laws which threaten to impede implementation of his agenda; all these behaviors are straight out of the fascist handbook, purely the stuff of Hitler and all authoritarian tyrants. As always, the even greater tragedy is that the majority Republican Congress,as is nearly always the case, seems poised to step aside and allow Trump to behave like and become a petty tyrannical dictator, to rule by decree, with their tacit approval. But surely there is a limit to this. Trump's approval rating nationally has suck to a new low, below sixty percent, and if current trends continue, he will soon be attempting to govern in his autocratic way with only a small minority of support from the American people. Congressional resistance and opposition to Der Fuhrer is growing, even among Republicans. Either Trump was purposely testing the waters, seeking the extent of his potential power, or he and his legal advisors harbor seriously distorted notions of what, precisely, the limits of presidential power really are. Probably a litle bit of both. Despite their tendency to rubber stamp all of Trump's misguided agenda, they, the Republicans, have shown a willingness, when forced into it, to distance themselves from Trump's more irrational actions, to draw the line before Trump gets totally out of hand. The Epstein files process is going to be played out. The public wants the entire sordid affair to be fully, publicly revealed. Besides making grand pronouncements about alien beings and attacking Iran, Trump, we must rest assured, has a whole host of actions at the ready for the only purpose of preserving and protecting his power. But he cannot make the Epstein files vanish. Its too late for that. The less puopular he becomes, the stronger his oposition at home and overseas, the more desperate he will become, and the more willing to take extreme, irrational action. He will not go down without his flaming martyrdom, and when he does, he will try to take as many of us as he can with him, including the entire country.