The end of the Mueller era is good news for Democrats
In a sense, the end of the major coverage about the Mueller Report is good news for Democrats. We were hardly able to talk about anything else at all for the better part of two years. Everything was Mueller, all the time. Indictments, leaked documents, speculation about collusion and obstruction dominated the news, while major developments, like Trump’s wars on the environment, on poor people, on gays, on Puerto Rico, on the intelligence services, on immigrants, on the Courts, on civil rights, on civility in discourse, and on most American values and institutions were under-reported, at best, in the 24-hour news cycle.
This benefited Trump enormously. He was doing horrible, unconscionable things: gutting regulatory agencies, undermining the protections Americans depended upon, weakening the nation’s healthcare safety net, alienating friends and cozying up to dictators, stacking the courts with political rightwingers, encouraging neo-nazis, fraying the fabric the holds the country together. It largely went unnoticed in the din and glare of RussiaGate. It’s true that the constant reporting on Mueller and RussiaGate provoked him to fury, but it’s also true that he was able to get away with most of his shenanigans under the radar. Now that the Mueller Report has all but vanished from news coverage, we can focus on all the things Trump is doing to hurt America.
And that is good for both Democrats and for America. Now that Trump’s misdeeds can be focused on for longer than 15 seconds, the American people are realizing he’s not a person they like. Take Betsy DeVos’s recent decision to kill the Special Olympics. Before the Mueller Report came out (or, actually, the Barr lie about the Mueller Report), that story would have been far down the list on the Nightly News. Post-Mueller, it got huge coverage—so bad, Trump was forced against his will to overrule DeVos and rescind it.
That’s an example of how the end of Mueller redounded to the Democrats’ favor (which means to America’s favor). Another is his threat (probably hollow) to shut down the Mexican border. If he’d tweeted that on a day when, for example, Paul Manafort was indicted, it would be been a second-rate story. As it turned out, it’s a huge story. Everybody is against it, except for Trump and the most ignorant of his minions. Ditto for Trump trying once again (what is this, the 40th time?) to destroy Obamacare. When he uttered his ridiculous “Republicans will be the party of healthcare” nonsense the other day, it was the political equivalent of dropping an H-bomb on Washington. If he’d said it on the same day that he fired Comey, it would have been little more than a laugh line on Saturday Night Live. But because he said it post-Mueller, it turns into a catastrophe for him and the Republican Party. McConnell immediately disowned it, and Trump has now had to say he’s kicking the healthcare can down the road to after 2020.
This is all wonderful news for Democrats. It proves that Trump is completely out of step with the American people, and the American people understand it. Not just Democrats (who have always been against him), but everybody—the working classes especially.
We’ve all been waiting for the Smoking Gun that would destroy Trump. They theory has been that, someday, there would be a huge, incredible story that would undermine his regime in a single stroke. Instead, the end of the Mueller era has been for Trump death by a thousand lashes. One by one, his destructive policies are being revealed to a public that is frankly alarmed and disgusted.
Besides, when I say “the end of the Mueller era,” let’s remember that it isn’t over, not by a long shot. We don’t even have a “Mueller Report” yet. We have no idea what incriminating and reputation-destroying facts it contains. And even Trump’s obvious struggle to prevent it from ever coming out, are turning against him, as a wide majority of Americans believes that we still don’t know the truth about RussiaGate, and that Trump is trying to cover up his crimes.
When I consider all the above, I am heartened by the prospects of the upcoming 2020 elections. We Democrats have some very good people running for president. I’m not at all worried about the undercurrents of dissent and in-fighting happening in the party at this time. It’s entirely natural. Let the candidates fight things out, let the voters bide their time and reflect. That’s the way the System is supposed to work. It’s all good.
