Aesop tells us, “A man is known by the company he keeps.”  Although it would be convenient to hope that in the case of President Trump he is wrong, the evidence is to the contrary. A quick look at the President’s company produces a rogue’s gallery of convicted felons, ethical question marks, and incompetents. If Aesop is right, we all need to run for the hills.

At the risk of both missing some of the more egregious cases and perhaps being too harsh on a few others, here is a sampler of the President’s men and woman:

Roger Stone.  He frequently wore stripes before his conviction. Now he gets to wear them permanently.  That tattoo of Nixon on his back will be a big hit in the prison shower.

Manafort. Trump needs to find someone else to run the 2020 Republican convention in Charlotte unless someone can get him a contraband cell phone and a 5G signal.

Rudy. How far can “America’s Mayor” fall?  Did he simply go insane or was there a hidden side to Mayor Giuliani all the time?

Lindsay Graham. Proof that ghosts do not come back to haunt.  If the late Senator McCain had any awareness of the ethical decline of his friend, he would be shaking his head and muttering an expletive. It’s one thing to become Trump’s chief defender in the Senate.  It’s another to initiate an investigation into the Bidens on the President’s behalf. Biden, you may know, is Senator Graham’s “good friend.”

Sarah Huckabee Sanders. For 23 months, Mike Huckabee’s daughter attempted to break the Guinness Book record for lying. Now, she indicates that she has been “called on” to run for Governor of Arkansas.  Arkansas isn’t the greatest place on earth, but what could be going on down there for God to wish for Sanders to occupy the State House?

Sean Spicer.  Best known for “Dancing with the Stars,” but he redefined the role of White House Press Secretary.  Have you read his book, The Briefing?  I passed. It has been described as “a bumbling effort at gaslighting Americans.”

Hope Hicks.  A key distinction Hicks enjoys over most of the rest of Trump’s associates is that she has publicly admitted that she lied for him. Don’t be too hard on her.  They were only “white lies.” Now, she has cashiered her White House experience into an EVP job at Fox.  

Michael Cohen.  Cohen repented his loyalty to Trump but only after his wing of the house of cards collapsed.  Everyone now knows what a “fixer” is even if his efforts with Stormy Daniels did not work out. He once said he’d take a bullet for Trump.  Now he’s behind bars serving a three-year sentence.

Steve Bannon. The “Chief Strategist,” also referred to by Trump as “Sloppy Steven,” was “dumped like a dog” by him. We should all be grateful he was dumped when he was.

Steven Miller. This documented racist not only writes emails like a Nazi, he also looks a bit like one. Yet this white nationalist still is at work at the White House.  (Okay, the crack about Miller’s appearance is a bit much, but read his emails.)

Kellyanne Conway.  Her White House role is best summarized in the words “alternative facts” but what about that Trump-hating husband of hers? 

Devin Nunes. Not only has he shared confidential Intelligence Committee information with the White House, but he allegedly met with Ukrainians to discuss “dirt” while on a taxpayer-funded Congressional trip.

Jared Kushner and Ivanka.  This selfless pair are key advisors to the President. They work for free, no doubt because they don’t care about money. Both are already laying plans for their future presidencies. 

Scott Pruitt. Because there have been so many rogues in this Administration, you may have forgotten about Trump’s first EPA Administrator.  He spent more than $3 million in his first year in office on “travel and security,” more than three times what his predecessor did. Add to that more than a half dozen serious allegations of ethics violations.

I’ll stop here, intentionally, because discussing Bill Barr, Mick Mulvaney and giants such as former wrestling coach Jim Jordan would make this piece too long.  I’m also not mentioning any “exceptions to the rule,” people like Mad Dog Mattis and John Kelly. Both need to be thanked for their service. The others, and the President, need to be held accountable for theirs.

J.E. Dean of Oxford is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He is a former counsel to the House Committee on Education and Labor.  For more than 30 years, he advised clients on federal education and social service policy.

I wasted a lot of time this week watching the impeachment hearings, and I put icing on the cake by diving into my pre-ordered copy of A Warning by Anonymous. I have nothing to show for my efforts in terms of new insights. Nor did I execute a civic duty by tuning in. I’ve read the Constitution: Nowhere in it does it suggest that watching TV or otherwise reading about the same things repeatedly makes America a better place.

Retrospection often brings wisdom, but it can also bring regret and anger. After accepting that my wasted hours should have been spent elsewhere, I turned to the question of whom to blame. Our President came to mind for obvious reasons but blaming him is like blaming your dog for bringing dirt into the house after a walk. The dirt is part of the price of having a dog. I suspect you know where I’m going with that . . .. I also thought of blaming Adam Schiff, not in an individual capacity, but as a representative of a group of citizens who reached their breaking point in putting up with what “s**t” and felt forced to doing something. Because I long ago became numb to White House stumbles, stunts and outrages that I once would have viewed as “harbingers of the end of an era,” I have ceased to see the pro-impeachment crowd as heroes. Instead, I credit them with being co-conspirators with Trump in the crime of wasting everyone’s time.

Okay, so I am not learning anything by focusing on the impeachment “crisis.” Is that to say that I really have learned nothing—that every second in front of my Korean-built idiot box or reading Anonymous’ opus is squandered time? Not quite. On the way to a self-imposed penance of self-hate for my own role in killing time, I picked up a few take-aways. These insights in no way mitigate the bottom line for my recent activities—wasted time is lost time.

My takeaways:

I am not outraged by Trump’s efforts to get Ukraine to investigate the Bidens. For anyone who has followed Trump’s stewardship of foreign affairs for the last three years, his actions were exactly what you would have expected. Trump said it best when he was quoted as saying he did not give a “f**k” about Ukraine. My assessment of Trump is that he doesn’t give a “f**k” about anyone but himself.

Devin Nunes is an embarrassment to humankind. Watch a replay or two of his opening statements at this week’s hearings. If you are attempting to teach a child what a toady is, use Nunes as an example.

I have been mispronouncing the name of the capital of Ukraine for decades. I always produced Kiev as two syllables. It’s one. I also learned it has multiple spellings. Should I ever make it to Jeopardy, I will be ready for the question. With luck, it will be a Daily Double.

Foreign service officers are remarkable people. Having known a few over the years, I always thought they were smarter than the rest of us. The ones on TV this week demonstrated intelligence, judgment and patriotism, qualities hard to find elsewhere in government.
“Ambassador” Sondland epitomizes much of what is wrong in Washington. How on earth did this “hotel executive” get his job? He gave Trump $1 million for his world-record size inaugural. No other qualifications needed. No college degree? Not an impediment to representing America before the EU.

Trump may or may not have committed an “impeachable offense” but, I am nonetheless sympathetic to the efforts to oust him. I had a dream one night this week—Trump packed up his Louis Vuitton luggage and fled the US, in Air Force One, of course, to seek asylum in Russia to avoid arrest. He took Rudy with him. I want both gone. More directly put, I find myself in the position of not caring about the nuances of the legal analysis of what he said on his now infamous phone calls with Zelensky. Aren’t there dozens upon dozens of other things Trump has done that are far worse?

I’m glad I don’t live in Ukraine. I wonder how the hearings are playing over there. Every witness and every member of Congress acknowledges that Ukraine is corrupt. It’s the one thing on which bipartisan agreement seems to exist.

I’m almost grateful that the impeachment hearings have drowned out the equally excessive coverage of the 2020 Democratic primary race. I say almost because I did notice that the wheels are starting to come off Warren’s campaign and a fresh moderate, whose name is mispronounced almost as often as that of the capital of Ukraine, is surging.

We have several more weeks of this soap opera to go, but to what end? Let’s say Trump get’s impeached. What does it get us? More uncertainty about what Trump, who some believe will adopt the behaviors of a cornered rat, will do. More political theater in the Senate, with Moscow Mitch and Lindsey Graham center stage.

A bottom line is that more time is about to be wasted. My challenge is whether to throw more of my own time onto the fire.

J.E. Dean of Oxford is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He is a former counsel to the House Committee on Education and Labor. For more than 30 years, he advised clients on federal education and social service policy.

It may be the height of naivete to expect either major political party to do anything much beyond raising money and loosely structuring a process to nominate national candidates.  A Senator who doesn’t even call himself a Democrat is now running for President with the full expectation that if he wins the primary process, he will be the party’s nominee. In 2016, candidate Trump declined to promise to support the party’s nominee and has routinely attacked Republican legislators that disagree with him.  And, with rare exceptions, neither party does much in the way of ethics. State, local and national candidates can fudge the truth with the full confidence of no pushback from the national party.

The fruit of this sad situation is declining respect for the national parties.  Even energetic Democrats, for example, will tell you they understand why Bernie Sanders declines to align himself as a co-partyist with a moderate like Joe Manchin.  Similarly, Trump’s base readily buys into the President’s claim that that George W. Bush administration was “corrupt.” He has stepped in, without so much as a hint of opposition, and redefined the party’s long-standing positions on trade while at the same time openly exhibiting conduct and endorsing policies viewed as racist by at least some of his fellow Republicans.

Many today suggest the parties are “imploding” and becoming progressively less important to American Democracy.  In part, this is because the traditional role of the party as a fundraising organization is being supplanted by the internet.  Candidates like Sanders and Warren both appeal to and solicit funds from voters directly, using the internet as the means. The party neither polices their efforts nor does anything else relevant to it. The fundraising itself is measured by the Federal Election Commission. The messaging’s effectiveness is measured in national polls.

If this trend continues, its only a matter of time that a successful third party or independent candidate emerges.  It could happen sooner than one might assume, especially if the dysfunction of both parties results in the nomination of candidates viewed by a critical mass as “out of the mainstream” or otherwise unacceptable.  Next year’s elections could see this scenario. Just think of a Trump v. Warren election.

The deterioration of parties could have catastrophic effects on how the American Democracy works.  Think of a Congress with several parties holding sizable voting blocks but with no majority. Think of a President freed from any thought of the impact of her actions on state and local elections.  And think of the scenario where an independent President dies in office and a virtual unknown, a vice president selected with little thought or diligence, suddenly assumes office.  

Examples of the benefits of having two, well-established national parties structure elections go far beyond my two examples. But, I would argue, their role does not go far enough.  And, if you agree the current system is breaking apart, rapidly but not irreversibly, it may be time to ask the national parties to assume a much larger role in policing elections.

Here are a few suggestions:

The parties should be required to comment on accuracy of fact assertions made by their own candidates.  If Trump claims Chinese imports exceed $ 10 trillion per year, the Republican party should call him on it.  Few candidates will want to be corrected by their own party. Most likely a trend towards more research and diligence will follow. 

The parties should issue budget estimates for all policy proposals put forth by major candidates.  If the numbers do not add up, as is the case for Elizabeth Warren’s many “plans,” the party would say so, perhaps issuing its own estimates.

Candidates that violate a specified set of party values would lose their right to run as a candidate of the party.  For example, if the Republicans adopted a “value” condemning racism, a suggestion that most Mexicans are rapists would get a candidate making such a statement tossed from the party. 

Candidates would have to meet minimum qualifications and meet specified requirements to run for President. Candidates failing would be denied the support of the party.   An example of how this might work may be found in national parties establishing rules for which candidates get to participate in national debates. Among the requirements would be the release of 10 years of tax returns. Specifying qualifications is more complex but perhaps should include things such as a minimum number of years in government or working closely with it.  

I could go on with the list, but the idea is simple.  Political parties must take ownership of the candidates that run under their banner.  While this might cause some attractive candidates to defect and possibly run as independents, the long-term impact would be to make the party label mean something. Voters could be confident that if candidate X was the Democratic candidate, an organization of competent, publicly minded experts have reviewed them and found them meritorious. Think of this as an imprimatur for candidates or and endorsement from Consumer Reports.

What happens if parties take on the task of better policing candidates and their proposals and do so incompetently or with bias?  Count on the press to call them on it. A party guilty of not performing these new roles would be identified as a failure by the press, something that hopefully would jeopardize their existence and encourage candidates to look elsewhere for a party with which to affiliate. 

Is all this naïve?  Maybe. But what is definitely naïve is to let the current system, the one that brought us Trump and that might very well have resulted in a giant like Beto O’Rourke getting a national nomination for President, continue to operate the way it does.

American Democracy needs parties, but those parties are not doing their job. They could soon disappear if they don’t embrace accountability.

J.E. Dean of Oxford is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He is a former counsel to the House Committee on Education and Labor.  For more than 30 years, he advised clients on federal education and social service policy.

Among the dozen Democrats who debated earlier this month in Ohio, one of the least known is Hawaii Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard. This piece is about a bizarre story that appeared in the news last week involving her, Hillary Clinton, the Russians, and a complete lack of judgment.  If you missed it, you are forgiven. Our President and his team dominated the news with statements and actions that may very well signal the end of the Trump era. Tulsi Gabbard’s actions, by comparison, were nothing. It was just her blowing up her own credibility, conclusively ending a campaign for President that was going nowhere anyway.

At first, I thought it was amateurish fake news. The title was, “Rep. Tulsi Gabbard Has Harsh Words for Hillary Clinton: ‘You, the Queen of Warmongers, Embodiment of Corruption.”  Strange. Then I noticed the story was in Newsweek. I soon realized dozens of other reputable publications were carrying the same story. Could it be that an exchange between Gabbard and Clinton so juvenile and nasty as to defy belief had occurred?

First, it’s worth noting that the language of Hillary was restrained in contrast with the all-out war of words launched by the Hawaiian Congresswoman. Hillary, in a podcast with David Plouffe, suggested Gabbard had backers in Moscow.  While not mentioning Gabbard by name, she commented, “I’m not making any predictions, but I think they’ve got their eye on somebody who is currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third-party candidate, . . . She’s the favorite of the Russians. They have a bunch of sites and bots and other ways of supporting her so far.”

This wasn’t the first time Hillary Clinton accused Trump supporters, including the Russians, of backing a spoiler candidate. In 2016, she claimed that Moscow and others were supporting Green Party candidate Jill Stein.  While this accusation is not proven, a Senate investigation and the Mueller report found that it held some credence. Russians, as part of their overall, well-documented efforts to elect Trump, sought to persuade African American voters that voting for Jill Stein was a good alternative to voting for Clinton. In so doing, they hoped to indirectly help Trump win. Interesting.

Clinton’s accusation, based on her 2016 comments and evidence indicating she may have been right, is not surprising.  Gabbard’s response to it was. It was a melt-down. It was behavior that was unjustified under any circumstances. It was behavior establishing beyond a doubt that Gabbard does not have the temperament to be President.

Her complete explosion, documented for history in the form of three tweets, reads in whole as follows: “Great! Thank you @HillaryClinton. You, the queen of warmongers, embodiment of corruption, and personification of the rot that has sickened the Democratic Party for so long, have finally come out from behind the curtain. From the day I announced my candidacy, there has been a concerted campaign to destroy my reputation. We wondered who was behind it and why.

Now we know — it was always you, through your proxies and powerful allies in the corporate media and war machine, afraid of the threat I pose. It’s now clear that this primary is between you and me. Don’t cowardly hide behind your proxies. Join the race directly.”  

In fairness to Gabbard, please note that she indicates she will not run as a third-party candidate. Let’s hope this is true. 

In hindsight, anyone who entertained Gabbard as the nominee, however briefly, should reexamine how they look at candidates.  I am among those in this category. I saw an articulate, energetic veteran running for President. She contrasted well to entrants like Beto O’Rourke, Marianne Williamson, and even, Kirsten Gillibrand.   It was not until I read about her bizarre support for al Assad in Syria that I took the trouble to learn more. Once I did, my antennas went up.   

The more you examine her positions, especially those relating to foreign policy, the more curious she becomes.  A prime example was her statement on Syria during the last debate. She offered, “Donald Trump has the blood of the Kurds on his hand, but so do many of the politicians in our country from both parties who have supported this ongoing regime change war in Syria that started in 2011.” She was corrected by Pete Buttigieg, who described her perspective as “dead wrong.”  She has also harshly criticized President Obama when he was in office for not using the term “radical Islamist.”

It is not uncommon to witness candidates blowing themselves up in the course of the grueling two years of campaigning that proceeds getting elected as President, but it seems each instance offers a separate lesson.  Whether it is Muskie crying publicly, Tom Eagleton’s mental health issues being disclosed, or Gary Hart getting exposed in a different way, Gabbard offers a clear lesson: If you want to be President, demonstrate Presidential poise and judgment on the campaign trail.  This means reacting with restraint even if you believe you have been attacked unfairly.

I will leave it to others to determine whether Gabbard is a “favorite of the Russians.”  If Putin is backing her, he made a bad choice. It’s also worth noting that some of Gabbard’s competitors have questioned the allegation she is working for the Russians, including Beto O’Rourke, Buttigieg, Williamson and Yang. But the issue is not whether Clinton’s claim is true, its how Gabbard responded to it. 

The Republican party has its mad tweeter. The Democratic party doesn’t need one.  

 J.E. Dean of Oxford is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He is a former counsel to the House Committee on Education and Labor.  For more than 30 years, he advised clients on federal education and social service policy.

I’m taking a break from politics. Although recent events did not contribute to what led me to focus on kindness, they were making me sick.

I just had major surgery to remove a tumor. Before the surgery I was afraid. I dreaded the trips to the hospital and, most of all, dreaded the surgery. The tumor, to my regret, has proven to be cancerous, but I’m not looking for sympathy. The physicians did a great job and tell me it is contained and treatable.  Believe me, I am aware that thousands of people are in much worse situations than I.

The news that the prognosis was favorable came after the operation. Before then, I got a refresher in how important kindness is. What is kindness? It is being friendly, considerate, patient and generous. Kind people, both family and hospital professionals, exhibited all these traits as I transitioned from being a relatively healthy adult one day to becoming a somewhat pathetic and helpless patient the next.   My life partner, Maria, is at the top of the chart. She not only did everything possible to help me keep things in perspective but proved to be a truly great patient advocate. When I was too depressed or stupid to ask questions, she did.

Next is the hospital. I won’t identify it or the kind, wonderful people I met there, but they included not only the doctors and nurses, but the receptionists, housekeepers, and technicians. This piece is about kindness and I’m sure there are wonderful people at many hospitals other than the one that treated me.

At the various reception desks, I was routinely greeted with a smile and complete attention. I was made to feel like something other than a number. I was addressed by my name and even thanked when I returned a completed information form.

When I had several preoperative tests, I was told exactly what was involved and how long the tests would take. This relieved my anxiety. I almost calmed down too much to pass a stress test.

Immediately before surgery, I had several meetings with various teams of doctors and researchers, the later participating in my case to gather data to determine why certain types of tumors develop in some people with no currently understood cause. The doctors were all quite positive, even when describing one scenario where the surgery would have left me in the hospital for a significant amount of time and could have resulted in some potentially permanent life changes. Fortunately, that scenario did not happen.  The doctors, especially the surgical team, did not act rushed and answered all my questions, including the naïve ones. I was never made to feel stupid.

In post-operative care, I was blessed to get a private room.  If you’ve ever been a patient in a hospital, I suspect you will agree this is the biggest luxury in the world.  I could close the door and sleep, but when I was awakened for the inevitable blood draws and vital sign checks, the nurses apologized for waking me and worked as quickly as possible to allow me to return to my slumber. Most of the time, they did not even turn on the lights.

Upon being discharged I immediately reflected on how important the care of the hospital staff and loved ones has been in getting me through a terrifying experience.  I also did a little reading that focused on the magic of kindness. Mark Twain wrote, “Kindness is a language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see.” Henry James wrote, “Three things in human life are important: the first is to be kind; the second is to be kind; and the third is to be kind.” The Dalai Lama XIV is quoted as saying, “My religion is very simple. My religion is to be kind.” 

My take-away from this experience is the lesson of how important kindness and civility are. I owe everyone who looked after me a debt.  I owe them a return of kindness to many others. I will also try to be more civil, even to nasty or rude people.

 It is unlikely that I will be able to return as much kindness as I received, but I will try.     

J.E. Dean of Oxford is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He is a former counsel to the House Committee on Education and Labor.  For more than 30 years, he advised clients on federal education and social service policy.  

How bad a President is Donald Trump?  Is he a good but misunderstood President?  Depending on your politics and where you get your news, he is dishonest, incompetent and perhaps insane, or he is the crafty businessman, courageous in reversing long-standing but counter-productive policies, and someone who has brought us three years of peace and prosperity.  Where is the truth?  How do you get  people in each camp to a common vision of the President?

Taking on this perhaps impossible mission requires a willingness to set aside one’s political preferences, be as unemotional as possible, and research a few statistics. It’s not easy. Five minutes of discussion on impeachment can result in F-bombs and broken friendships.  And it will only get worse as the House proceeds with impeachment proceedings this fall.

The question of assessing Trump is not an assessment of whether he committed “high crimes and misdemeanors” or criminal offenses. Rather, it involves looking at his record in a larger context and including things cited as evidence of a successful Presidency.

Here are a few things to consider:

Record low unemployment rates.  Few would have imagined the current rate of 3.5 percent possible.  For African Americans, it’s 5.5 percent, still too high, but a record low worth celebrating.

A healthy economy.  The economy, as evidenced in a positive GDP growth and a robust stock market, is doing well for most of us. Some have been predicting a recession for the last two years, but it hasn’t come.  Does Trump get the credit because of his tax and regulatory policies? 

Trade. Perhaps in no other area has Trump broken more with his predecessors than in the area of trade. His efforts to address trade imbalances and protect American intellectual property are well documented. The fact that Bernie Sanders, among others, has suggested that something needs to be done to re-invigorate American industry tells you something.  You may disagree with the trade war that has resulted and fear its long-term consequences, but it’s impossible to dismiss the fact Chinese imports are down.

Peace.  While some may argue that as long as any U.S. troops are in harm’s way the country is not at peace, the fact is that no new wars have been initiated despite, and perhaps because of, Trump’s often belligerent tones with North Korea, Iran, and others. Teddy Roosevelt is praised for his “Speak softly but carry a big stick” foreign policy. Trump rarely speaks softly, but he is carrying a big stick and is perceived by adversaries as willing to use it. 

Resetting America’s relationship with our allies. While some believe Trump is jeopardizing the long-standing relationships with allies like Germany, his call for NATO members to pay “their fair share” of the cost of the military alliance has produced results. Were allies like Germany and Japan taking American support for their defense for granted?  If so, they are not doing that now.

Loss of World Leadership.  America is no longer seen as a world leader by many of our allies. The best example is the withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accords. If you believe climate change is a global threat, withdrawal from this agreement, whatever its flaws, must be seen as a negative.  In addition, Trump’s practice of making world-impacting decisions unilaterally has hurt.

Undermining civility in political debate.  For this one, there are more than a thousand actions that may be cited as evidence.  Should Nancy Pelosi and Adam Schiff be tried for treason? Should Mitt Romney be impeached?  Should any President use foul language at rallies or anywhere else?

Racism.  Is calling Mexicans rapists and criminals evidence of racism?  What about enhanced immigration policies?  Please note that some view the restrictive immigration policies as a positive, does anyone really support splitting up families and some of the other harsh practices documented in the last two years on the border?

Appointment of incompetent or corrupt officials to public offices.  Pruitt, Perry, Carson, Ross and DeVos, are but five examples.  There are dozens more.  And are you okay with nepotism?

Unstable executive leadership. No, despite claims by some to the contrary, I’m not talking about Trump himself.  Rather, it’s the endless resignations, firings, and acting appointments to dozens of positions, including 2 of 15 cabinet offices, and 11 others to senior appointments, including the director of OMB and National Intelligence, as well as the President’s own chief of staff. Why can’t this administration vet officials before appointing them?

Russia.  Is Russia our friend or ally?  While proof of their interference in the 2016 elections is dispositive, Trump has appeared beholden to Putin. What is going on?

The National Debt.  Did Trump let the National debt get “out of control?”  The $22.6 trillion National Debt is indeed increasing, notwithstanding campaign promises to the contrary, but Trump is arguably no worse than other recent Presidents.  Clinton, aided by a strong economy, is an exception.

Private inurement.  The allegation is that Trump is using the Presidency for his personal gain. This allegation is supported by the military using one of his golf resorts in Ireland during refueling stops and, of course, the Trump International Hotel in Washington. Are these things illegal?  That is currently under investigation/resolution. Until then, the jury is out.

Corruption. Some argue Trump is no more corrupt than the Clintons, Obama, or, most recently, Joe Biden. Do two wrongs make a right?   

Tweeting. Trump’s tweets are hated by many but, in fact, represent a new chapter in Presidential transparency. Although his writings are highly selective, few would argue that this President speaks more to the American public, and more directly, than any President before him.

Supreme Court nominees. The bruising battle over Judge Kavanaugh is now behind us but calls for his impeachment continue. Depending on your politics, you will like or dislike Trump’s two appointments to date. Both have proven to be exactly what he promised, conservative votes on the Nation’s highest court.

Okay, so where does this leave us?  For this writer, the negatives far outweigh the positives.  Despite the positives, the negatives, most of them resulting from Trump’s volatility, disdain for expert advice, racism, and his New York real estate world view, render him a disaster. More importantly, I fear what Trump may do in coming months as the impeachment process proceeds. 

We live in troubled times. Trump’s problems are not going away.  It will get worse. Stay tuned.

J.E. Dean of Oxford is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He is a former counsel to the House Committee on Education and Labor.  For more than 30 years, he advised clients on federal education and social service policy.

President Trump will be impeached, possibly before Christmas. This sobering reality is setting in as the evidence against Trump builds.  His request for a favor from Ukrainian President Zelensky, bolstered by the withholding of American military assistance, is widely viewed as an illegal impeachable offense.  News as October starts includes involvement by Attorney General Barr and Secretary of State Pompeo in the scandal.  Trump’s response to the whistleblower, his imprudent tweets, attempting to cover up evidence, suggesting a civil war will break out if he is removed from office and accusing a Member of Congress of treason, is perhaps worse.

Trump’s Presidency is in jeopardy and he knows it. His response is that of a shady New York real estate developer in trouble with the regulators—deny everything, throw up a smokescreen, accuse the accuser, and fight back with everything you got. That approach is not likely to work in Washington, especially now that the evidence against him is overwhelming and growing. Urgency has replaced hesitancy as Democrats are no longer afraid to take Trump on. Impeachment seems inevitable.

As this sad story unfolds, we will come to understand Trump better. Among the insights on the horizon is that he did not realize that asking the Ukrainian President for a favor was wrong, that hiding evidence of his conversation with Zelensky was illegal, and that, of course, lying is not okay, even if you believe all politicians lie.  If you are “the most powerful man in the world,” can’t you do whatever you want?  Isn’t it true that the President is immune from criminal prosecution?  And can’t he just pardon himself?

Trump is a believer in the adage that all is fair in love and politics. His rise to the Presidency reinforced his belief that to win you must fight.  What many see as moral failings or worse, he sees as evidence of his strength and leadership.  And given his belief that his political opponents, including the press, are out to get him, he no doubt feels justified in hitting back, hard.

Better understanding Trump, or thinking that you do, doesn’t make what is happening any less unsettling. In many ways, it makes it worse. Damage has been done, and more is coming.  The impeachment process itself will be ugly. And Trump’s reactions if the Senate removes him from office could be worse.  Would he leave or would he claim the process was rigged and refuse to exit? 

Many of the President’s opponents are expressing relief that the Trump era may soon be over. If he goes, that relief may be short lived.  A President Pence would trigger a year of world-wide confusion about who is running the country.  He is unknown to most, here and abroad, and his extreme views on many matters preclude his ability to reunify the country in the way Gerald Ford did after Nixon. Even worse, Trump’s departure is likely to leave the Republican party in irreparable shambles.  The party has been tarred with the racism, incompetence, and greed of Trump and the cowardly responses of Congressional Republicans to it.  Many believe the brand has been permanently destroyed. And until a new party emerges to represent limited government, balanced budgets, free trade, and neutrality on social issues, we may effectively have one-party rule in most of the country.

These are unsettling times for America. As citizens, we can only hope that the nightmare ends soon and that a rebuilding process begins.

J.E. Dean of Oxford is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He is a former counsel to the House Committee on Education and Labor.  For more than 30 years, he advised clients on federal education and social service policy. He is the former chairman of the National College Access Network (NCAN), a group promoting success in higher education among underrepresented groups, and KnowledgeWorks Foundation, a national leader in strategic foresight and education innovation.   

Donald Trump’s dream is that Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders wins the Democratic nomination for President. Recent polls, while documenting Bernie’s slow fade from the national stage, also shows Biden continuing to lose support. The emerging winner may be Senator Warren. If this happens, Trump’s dream may become real. He may get to run against a Democrat susceptible to ridicule and who scares many independent voters.  

Why is Warren doing so well? What is her appeal? It seems to be her anger, her certainty on who the enemy is, and her cornucopia of big promises. At least for now, this formula appears to be a winner, especially when you suggest your new programs won’t cost average taxpayers a dime.

If this sounds good, why not take it up a notch? Despite a generally good economy, why not suggest the country is on the threshold of economic doom?  Many voters are halfway there already. Polls show voters, especially younger ones, uneasy about Trump, climate change and their own future. They are ready for Warren. She’s giving them the message they want to hear.

For good or for ill, the voters most receptive to Warren are not those who will determine who gets inaugurated in 2021.  The possibility of a Warren campaign on steroids should make anyone nervous. Unfortunately, however, appealing to moderate voters to date has been a ticket to irrelevance for everyone in the race except Joe Biden.  Because of this Warren, hoping to build momentum, and other candidates, hoping to replace Warren as the emerging front-runner, we are likely to see more “big plans.” But what could be promised that has not already been offered by one of the progressives in the race?

Here are a few examples, not things that a moderate would propose, but which would not surprise anyone if proposed in coming weeks by either Senator Warren or Bernie Sanders:

“Cars for all.” Just as healthcare is arguably a basic human right that must be reflected in a plan, so too is transportation.  People without cars or other easy means to get from one place to another are handicapped. They can’t accept many jobs because they can’t get to them. They frequently can’t go to school or job training for the same reason. And they may not be able to access healthcare because patients go to doctors rather than doctors to patients.  The cost would be more than $15 billion a year, one might guess, but the beauty of this idea is that you can claim it will pay for itself. The people who get cars or “transportation vouchers” under the program would become more productive. And more productive people pay more taxes. These taxes would pay for the program. It’s like magic.  Also, cars provided would be electric, something that would help combat climate change and create new green jobs.

A National Workers’ Holiday Month.  Instead of unimaginatively adding a new national holiday or two, why not mandate a full month?  And why not name it after those citizens who, under the current system, will never be able to take a full month off work?  The month would be August, just like France, and not only would non-essential federal offices close, but most private sector business would also be required to shut down. The month off would be a definite crowd pleaser, but, more importantly, climate changing pollution would decrease dramatically for a month and, because the economy would have to make up the production lost to the holiday, unemployment would drop.  With less unemployment comes less welfare, which would save the government lots of money. Businesses would also save on air conditioning costs and, well, you know the rest. Advocates of this proposal are likely to argue that it would not adversely impact the economy because people would work harder in September when they returned to work. They would also argue that the shut-down would save the government and business overhead costs. 

Free Cable /Streaming TV for All.  Many low-income Americans do not have access to HBO, Showtime, Netflix, Amazon Prime or even the Cartoon Network.  This is creating a cultural elite of one class of citizens getting premium channels and networks and others stuck with the legacy networks of NBC, ABC, PBS, CBS, and Fox.  This is not fair. The solution is to require all media companies to make their programming available for free on a broadcast channel. If a consumer still wants to pay for cable TV, it would be their right to do so.  But those without $200 a month to spend on television would no longer have to pretend they don’t like Game of Thrones and other TV.  This proposal would cost the government nothing because the “donation” of the programming would be required as a condition of being licensed by the federal government.  The government would also benefit by being able to include sponsored messages on its new channels. More anti-smoking public service announcements, for example, would reduce government-paid healthcare costs.  The money saved here could be used to provide Smart TVs to those citizens who will need one to tune into their free programming. 

I could go on, but I suspect you get where this is headed.  We haven’t seen the worst of the “big ideas” that some candidates may be working on even as I write this.  Please also know that I am most definitely not proposing any of these “impossible dreams.”  The three examples offered here are not intended as thought-starters for Warren, Bernie, or some other candidate hoping to jump-start a moribund campaign.

America needs a moderate candidate to get the Democratic nomination and to win the Presidency in 2020.  Some might like some of my tongue-in-cheek “impossible dreams.” But defeating Trump requires not alienating swing voters and being a good President means not bankrupting the country by nationalizing anything not nailed down.  Elections should not be run on the candy store model with candidates tripping over themselves to win voters with the biggest promises. 

Donald Trump is dreaming about a candidate he can call a socialist.  We owe it to ourselves not to let that happen.

J.E. Dean of Oxford is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He is a former counsel to the House Committee on Education and Labor.  For more than 30 years, he advised clients on federal education and social service policy. He is the former chairman of the National College Access Network (NCAN), a group promoting success in higher education among underrepresented groups, and KnowledgeWorks Foundation, a national leader in strategic foresight and education innovation.

Did you remember Bill Maher calling President Trump “more of a gross creep than Harvey Weinstein”?  How about Jimmy Kimmel saying that the President “has the memory and the skin tone of a goldfish” after he remarked that he’d never heard of a Category 5 hurricane?  And John Oliver of Last Week Tonight, not wanting to miss out on the fun, mocked Melania Trump in a piece on Trump’s proposal to buy Greenland.  He described Greenland as “icy, distant, and semi-autonomous” and added, “It’s exactly Trump’s type” while showing a picture of Trump and First Lady Melania. Nice. Were you rolling around on the floor in laughter? Are you secretly dreading the end of the Trump era because Elizabeth Warren, Joe Biden, or Amy Klobuchar are tougher material for comedians to work with?

If you are among the millions of Americans who get much of their news through shows originally developed as comedy such as  Last Week Tonight and The Daily Show, or who have chosen to get your news through outlets with a focused bias, such as Fox or MSNBC, you are in the mainstream. Only about 10 percent of Americans rely primarily on newspapers for news today. Is this a good thing? In 1816, Thomas Jefferson said “If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.”  Would Jefferson consider voters who got most of their news in the form of political satire well informed? I doubt it.  

A friend recently suggested that “politics as comedy” unintentionally aids the re-election of Trump.  Heaven forbid! The suggestion is that the Trump base, like Trump himself, is thin-skinned and rises to defend the President when he is under attack. What better way to voice your rejection of the anti-Trump media than to vote for him?

Political comedy is nothing new. A reading of Aristophanes will tell you that the treatment of Trump is not much different than that afforded to various Greek politicians of ancient times.  Political comedy also has been with us throughout our history. Remember those skits of Gerald Ford falling down the stairs of Air Force One on SNL? Or Tina Fey’s ridicule of Sarah Palin?  What about Al Gore and his social security lockbox or the ridicule that ensued when he claimed to invent the Internet? No major political figure has been spared. If anything is different with Trump, maybe it stems from his propensity to do and say ridiculous things.  

Today we are witnessing an endless flow of political satire, most of it directed at Trump, his family, or his policies. The audience, presumed by many to consist of Democrats and “Trump-haters” continues to grow, suggesting that voters’ understanding of Trump is growing.  But is it? And is my friend right in suggesting that political satire may work to Trump’s benefit in 2020?  

The theory of the resolution of cognitive dissonance suggests that once voters make a choice, as 61.9 million did in 2016, attacks on their choice prompt them to defend it.  Thus, when a comedian calls Trump a “Nazi” for his immigration policy, Trump voters see it as an attack on themselves. The effect can also extend to policies, such as immigration or even climate change denial, and lead to new support for Trump, if voters see attacks on Trump for his positions on these issues as attacks on themselves.   

If comedy targeting Trump is working to his benefit, what can or should be done?   The answer is probably nothing beyond encouraging awareness of the role of comedy in politics today.  Any attempt to censor comedians not only violates the Constitution, it would also fail. Also, sympathy may be created for Trump because the attempt to silence the comedians would unintentionally “confirm” that the “attacks” on Trump were wrong.  Most comedians and most commenters on news programs would also, correctly, ignore the unconstitutional attempts to stop the ridicule.  

Thus, those of us who would like to see a more disciplined, issue and fact-based campaign, need to resign ourselves to more political satire.  Better yet, enjoy the satire, but remember that it is not news. Watch Fox or MSNBC but remind yourself that what you are hearing is anything but fair and balanced.  Perhaps we should encourage friends and neighbors to diversify their information sources and encourage discussion of real issues. Perhaps most importantly, we should remind ourselves that the ridicule of Trump that often seems ubiquitous is not a sign of his impending political demise. If Trump is to be defeated, it will take more than a few jokes from Stephen Colbert or Jimmy Fallon to make it happen.

J.E. Dean of Oxford is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He is a former counsel to the House Committee on Education and Labor.  For more than 30 years, he advised clients on federal education and social service policy. He is the former chairman of the National College Access Network (NCAN), a group promoting success in higher education among underrepresented groups, and KnowledgeWorks Foundation, a national leader in strategic foresight and education innovation.