Another Unoriginal Thought

Not so long ago, I commented that I thought one reason Trump was focusing so much on foreign policy was that his power in the domestic sphere was slipping away.

His attempt to use the government shutdown for a power grab had failed.  The Supreme Court had limited his power to impose unilateral tariffs and deploy the National Guard domestically.  ICE failed to subdue Minneapolis and had sparked a public backlash.  The Senate refused to end the filibuster.  More and more Epstein material kept leaking.  Anthropic was taking the Administration to court.  And the midterms looked really bad.

So Trump focused on foreign policy and war, because there is very little that can be done to constrain a President in foreign policy and military matter.  Except, of course, that "very little can be done" means that little can be done domestically.  The enemy still gets a veto.

And now that Trump's overseas war is not going so well, it appears he is turning back to domestic matters, with some success.  The Supreme Court has not only authorized, but mandated Republicans to gerrymander the South in their favor.  Indiana Republicans who defied Trump have lost their primaries.  The Attorney General is pursuing indictments against James Comey (for seashells) and the Southern Poverty Law Center for using informants, with who knows what to come.  And now he is proclaiming political opponents to be terrorists.

Look, there are signs of growing push-back against Trump's power.  But he is becoming more abusive the more he feels threatened. 

Buckle up.
 

Some Obvious Points About Donald Trump

 

Trump famously embodies the Dunning-Kruger effect, whereby people who know very little about a field think they know much more than they actually do.  He is also the walking embodiment of H.L. Mencken's maxim that complex problems have simple, easy to understand, wrong answers.

That is, of course, a major source of his appeal.  He appeals to people who don't know any more about policy questions than he does and assume that there are simple solutions out there that politicians have not adopted because they are too stupid, corrupt, or weak-willed.  Trump claims that he will cut through the red tape and fix everything by not being half-hearted about it.  Of course, when his profoundly ignorant claims run up against reality, things tend not to go so well.

In his first term, Trump appealed to people's complaints about Obamacare.  "We'll have great health care at a fraction of the cost and it will be so easy."  It was, after all, what people wanted to hear.  After working on it a while, Trump complained, "Who knew health policy was so complicated."  Not many people, Donald, just anyone who knows anything at all about health policy.  Admittedly, this is a fairly small portion of the total population.  He ended up with a plan to repeal Obamacare with no replacement and thereby strip 20 million people of their health insurance.  I think even the least informed members of the pubic would have noticed that.

Much the same applied when Trump agreed to a summit with the North Koreans.  He only cared about the pomp and pageantry and was not interested in trivial details like what agreement they might reach.

For his second term, Trump promised to end the war in Ukraine in one day.  Presumably he believed that his friend Pooty, would happily end the war as a personal favor.  To the extent the Ukrainians were unwilling to agree to Putin's terms, a little arm twisting should bring them into line.  Well, this failed for much the same reason -- Trump thinks of foreign policy solely in terms of personal relationships and has no idea that countries have interests that transcend the individuals in charge.  

So too with the Iran war.  The Iranians' clear wish up until February 28 to avoid war with a much stronger country made Trump think they were pushovers and easily intimidated.  What he didn't understand was that the regime was never going to agree to its own destruction, or that it would fight fiercely when cornered, although both points should have been obvious.  He appears to have believed that Iran would be intimidated into submission by the mere presence of US forces or, failing that, that he would have been able to swap out the name at the top for someone more compliant, just the way it has worked in Venezuela.

When that failed, Trump's advisors apparently convinced him that if he blockaded the straits, pressure would build up in Iran's oil storage and threaten to blow up in a matter of days, which would presumably force their capitulation.  Well, spoiler alert, that didn't happen either.  Trump now seems to believe that if he threatens and cajoles enough the Iranians will agree to his terms in a matter of days.  He has no patience for the long, drawn-out process of diplomacy.  

In the case of Obamacare, the dying John McCain made one last appearance in the Senate to save his party from itself and vote down repeal.  No deal was reached in either Korea or Ukraine, so the situation continued -- bad, but ultimately something most Americans could live with.

Well, the war in Iran is looking to be the most intractable problem yet.  Continuing that status quo is clearly not acceptable and bound to get worse, but there is no easy out.

Maybe next time don't elect President Dunning-Kruger.

Reflections on the Gerrymanders

 

The original gerrymander

I was confused by reports on the latest Supreme Court outrage.  A decision that allows states to gerrymander to reduce minority representation but not to increase it???  How does that work?

It appears that the answer is that the Supreme Court held that states may not take race into account in drawing voting districts may may consider partisanship.  The practical effect of this was to remove the last barrier to Republican gerrymandering in southern states.  Up till now, Republican legislatures in the South were not allowed to deliberately break up Black districts.  They are now free to do so, so long as they claim to be setting boundaries for partisan, rather than racial, reasons.  Presumably Democratic states could do the opposite -- maximize minority representation so long as they claim partisan motives.

Naturally Republicans are cackling gleefully, boasting about redrawing their districts to ensure that Republicans have permanent control of Congress.

Just last week, Republicans were outraged that Virginia had redrawn its districts to move Democrats' advantage from 6-5 to 10-1.  And given the general makeup of the Virginia electorate, that move, taken by itself, would be egregiously unfair.  But Republicans are ignoring their own behavior leading up to the Virginia move, redrawing electoral maps in Texas, Missouri, Ohio, and North Carolina, with Florida next in line.  

And no, this is not two children on the playground yelling about who started it, or a game of tit for tat. This is about whether Democrats will unilaterally disarm, giving Republicans a complete free hand to draw districts to their advantage while Democrats refrain.  Last week Republicans were denouncing how unfair the Virginia gerrymander was and pointing out other Democratic states that were gerrymandered (sometimes even denouncing states with just one Representative for not having a proportionate share of Republicans!) while totally ignoring the gerrymanders in Republican states.  Now Republicans are boasting about redrawing districts so as to ensure that Democrats can never hold Congress again.  

Sigh!  I know Republicans don't read my blog.  (Neither does anyone else, really).  But simply put, the options are like this:

No one gerrymanders	Republican gerrymander Democrats don’t
Democrats gerrymander Republicans don’t	Both parties gerrymander

So far as I can tell, Democrats, given the opportunity to rank their preferences, would do it as follows:

1. No one gerrymanders	4. Republican gerrymander Democrats don’t
3. Democrats gerrymander Republicans don’t	2. Both parties gerrymander

Republicans, by contrast, appear to rank their preferences as follows:

4. No one gerrymanders	1. Republican gerrymander Democrats don’t
4. Democrats gerrymander Republicans don’t	4. Both parties gerrymander

It is not even clear to me that Republicans are able to distinguish among the other three options.

On the Other Hand

Consider:

August, 2025:  Former DOGE staffer "Big Balls" injured in a carjacking.  Trump deploys the National Guard to Washington DC and an immigration crackdown, even though the carjackers were natural born US citizens.

September, 2025:  Charlie Kirk assassinated.  Stephen Miller pledges an "all of government" crackdown on the opposition.  JD Vance and others urge people to comb the internet for criticisms of Charlie Kirk and have the people making them fired.  Talk of a "Reichstag Fire moment."

November, 2025:  Afghan National drives from Washington State to Washington, DC to shoot two members of the National Guard.  Trump Administration cuts off asylum applications from 19 Muslim countries and starts arresting lawfully present Afghan asylum seekers when they check in.

December, 2025:  Investigations of fraud by the Somali community in Minnesota lead the Trump's biggest and most brutal immigration crackdown to date.

April 25, 2026:  Attempted assassination of Donald Trump, JD Vance and much of his Cabinet at the White House Correspondent's Dinner.  Trump and his followers respond -- with an all-out push to approve the proposed White House ballroom.

Honestly, if that is the worst thing to emerge from the latest assassination attempt, I would consider that very fortunate indeed!

About That Southern Poverty Law Center Indictment . . . .

 

In all honesty, I was starting to feel ready to declare victory in the Charlie Kirk matter and say that it had not, after all, turned out to be our Reichstag Fire moment.  No political opponents or organizations had been charged.  People fired in the wake of the assassination were starting to sue to get their jobs back.  Instead of a government attempt to bring down the Great Leftwing Conspiracy that killed Charlie Kirk, rightwing conspiracists were pointing the finger at each other.

Oh, yes, and Ed Martin was fired from the "Weaponization Working Group," supposedly for failing to do any actual weaponization.  At the time (February 2) the report was that it was supposed to get results within two months.  Well, two months have passed and all it has produced is a report criticizing the Biden Administration for prosecuting protesters blocking access to abortion clinics.  And then there was the prosecution of anti-ICE protesters who really did set off fireworks outside an ICE facility and shoot a police officer.  Some have complained about over-charging.  I was less concerned because (1) there really was a crime and (2) like it or not, federal over-charging is nothing new.  Don't bring guns and fireworks to a protest seems like a sound rule to me.

Well, just when you thought it was safe to get back in the water, the Administration released an indictment of the Southern Poverty Law Center for paying informants in the groups it was investigating.  It seems at least plausible that the Law Center identifying Turning Point USA as an extremist group may have been a factor in the decision to indict.  Honestly, most critics I have read about the indictment are dismissing it as propaganda, to justify the far right marchers in Charlottesville.  I am inclined to think it is more for two reasons.  One is that this may be just the beginning.  Other such indictments may be coming.  The other is that the purpose of this indictment is obvious -- to chill any other organization that may express views the Administration dislikes.

Anyhow, back to the signs that Trump's power may be waning:

1. Media outlets bought by Trump allies are willing to criticize or oppose him:  CBS continues to run worthwhile stories on Trump, as do the Los Angeles Times and the Washington Post, so I am hopeful on this score.
2. State Republicans defy Trump.  No real change from last time.
3. Republicans in Congress splinter and Trump cannot bring them into line: This clearly happened on the SAVE Act.  It may be happening on funding as well.
4. Attempts to target opposing organizations through taxes or RICO are thrown out, or never materialize:  The latest indictment of the Southern Poverty Law Center is a bad sign.
5. Universities, high power law firms, and other institutions targeted by Trump start consistently defying him:  Not much changed from last time.
6. The Supreme Court makes a meaningful attempt to reign Trump in:  He lost on the National Guard and tariffs, although he keeps threatening to ignore the tariffs decision.  Prospects on birthright citizenship do not look good.
7. Democrats win control of the House and Trump cannot stop them:  Too early to say, obviously.  But Trump acknowledging that the President's party tends to lose during midterms may be an encouraging sign.
8. Democrats win control of the Senate and Trump cannot stop them: Ditto.
9. Growing numbers of state and local jurisdictions reject cooperation with ICE, putting more strain on the organization:  No.  This might happen after midterms, but not before.
10. ICE starts losing personnel faster than it can recruit them and begins shrinking: No.
11. Big money interests start standing up to him:  Anthropic has, anyhow.
12. Trump supporters stop making death threats and harassment against people who he criticizes:  Maybe I should drop this one because there are just too many crazies out there.

 Donald Trump has always made his fortune ripping off the gullible rubes.  And it appears that there is not a more gullible set of rubes than the ones on Wall Street.

What Is It About Ultra-Nationalists and Treason?

 This one isn't even thinking outside the box.  It is a widely observed phenomenon.  

In the first half of the twentieth century, a wave of extreme rightwing movment arose all across Europe.  Invariably, their claim to legitimacy was in their nationalism.  They mocked the liberals with their universal human rights and the socialists with their international brotherhood of labor as unreliable and not truly devoted to their country.  When the chips were down, could these groups really be counted on to stand up for their country, or was it only the far right who could be trusted.

And then Hitler showed up, and the far-right nationalists all proved to be a pack of traitors.*  

For a while, we might dismiss this as a historical curiosity, something unlikely to repeat.

And now here we are.  Another rightwing nationalist movement is sweeping Europe, and the US.  And once again, they are turning out to be a pack of traitors.  As Orban's cronies frantically shred documents to conceal the full extent of their collaboration with the Russians, we really need to give some thought as to why this keeps happening.  Because at some point it starts looking less and less like a coincidence and more and more like something innate to the ideology.

_________________________________________________
*One might make a exception for Lindberg's America First movement that looked like a potential pack of traitors but ultimately rallied to the Allied side during WWII.  On the other hand, one can also argue that America First never became traitors because they never had the opportunity.

Everyone Makes Mistakes

 

Me oh my!  Looking back at my November 30, 2025 post on which would be a worse President, Trump or Vance, I gave the advantage to Vance in most categories, but not all.*

The main categories that I saw as advantage Trump were weaponization of government (Trump has been too personal and petty; Vance would be more competent), immigration (Trump might be willing to carve out exceptions; Vance will not), and foreign policy.  Obviously, I was wrong about foreign policy.

My assumption was that Trump's foreign policy was based mostly on impulse rather than any ideological principles.  If his foreign policy has the practical effect of favoring authoritarianism over democracy, it is not because Trump has any principled preference for authoritarians, but just because they bribe and flatter him better.  Vance, by contrast, seemed to have a firmly principled opposition to liberal democracy and a principled preference for rightwing dictatorships.

My focus was on Europe in general and Ukraine in particular.  Given the choice between Vance, who appeared to have the goal of placing Europe under Russian control, either by puppet governments or outright military conquest, and Trump who seemed to be working for a similar outcome more by accident than by design, I preferred Trump, who might accidentally oppose Putin over Vance who was firmly committed against such a thing.  While I generally wanted to see Trump have an incapacitating stroke or wig out so badly that even his Cabinet saw no choice but to invoke the 25th Amendment, I sort of hoped that could wait until things got better for Ukraine.

And things did.  In fact, I am beginning to wonder whether Trump actually did Ukraine a favor in cutting off US aid.  His actions had the result of (1) pressuring Europe to step forward sufficiently that our actions matter much less; (2) forcing the Ukrainians to innovate, and (3) removing whatever restrictions we placed on the Ukrainians.  All of this seems to have rebounded to their favor.  Withdrawing support erratically and inconsistently proved useful because it gave both Ukraine and Europe time to adapt.  So, we just may have reached the point where we can safely turn over European policy to Vance.**

In the meantime, Trump has made a massive blunder starting the war with Iran.  While he has agreed to an indefinite ceasefire and clearly wants out, he also appears to be doing everything he can to make meaningful negotiations impossible.  Vance, in the meantime, had the sense to oppose the war and would be a basically normal negotiating partner who would at least not blow things up with erratic behavior that left no one knowing what his actual negotiating position is.  

So, on foreign policy advantage Vance.  And that alone is reason to say advantage Vance overall.

________________________________________
*To say nothing of the numerous categories where it was really hard to say. 

**Or we may not. If Vance is really determined to see the Russians win, he has a few cards left to play.  He can cut off intelligence sharing with the Ukrainians.  I have no idea whether the Europeans would be able to fill the gap.  It is also my understanding that the clear turning point in Ukraine's favor was Elon Musk denying the Russians access to Starlink, while allowing it to Ukrainians.  Vance's strongest card is probably to pressure Musk to reverse course.

Umberto Ecco on Trump

On the same topic, I am reminded of Umberto Ecco's piece on the characteristics of "Ur-Fascism."  Ecco grew up in Italy under true Fascism and acknowledged that it may not duplicate in full detail.  He nonetheless presented 14 characteristics of "Ur-Fascism" that he said to look out for.  A sufficient number is at least somewhat fascistic, and even one can allow fascism to "coagulate around it."

Some of Ecco's traits may be present among certain rightwing influencers, but seem too intellection for Trump.  I do intend to go over them at length some time in the future, but at present the third one seems the most important:

3. Irrationalism also depends on the cult of action for action’s sake. Action being beautiful in itself, it must be taken before, or without, any previous reflection. Thinking is a form of emasculation.

Bingo!  This was a major failing of GW Bush.  It is also a major failing of Donald Trump.  Seeing the same flaw repeated so closely in both administrations makes me think it is endemic to the rightwing outlook.*

And that is a serious problem.

__________________________________________________

*At least in the US.  I can't speak so much for other countries.

Contempt for Experts/Contempt for Facts

So, negotiations with Iran have failed, purportedly over the nuclear issue -- the US team wanted Iran to give up all uranium enrichment and Iranians refused.  Trump's negotiations with the Iranians have consistently failed, at least in part, because Trump's team lacks the nuclear expertise to know what will and will not actually be an adequate safeguard to keep the Iranians from developing nuclear weapons. 

But can we face facts here?  Donald Trump doesn't want a deal that meets the technical standards needed to keep Iran from developing nuclear weapons.  He wants to be able to boast that he held firm and never made any concessions.  Or if we absolutely must come up with a deal, he wants a deal that he can sell to people completely ignorant of the technical details (Trump, say) as something that can ensure Iran will never get a nuclear weapon.  They will never trust anything that rests on technical fine points that Trump and company don't understand.

And this leads to a major failing of Donald Trump and, indeed, of the Republican Party and rightwing politics in general.

I previously wrote about someone who described GW Bush as:

• More egotistical than Johnson
• More vindictive than Nixon
• Stupider than Ford
• Less competent than Carter
• Lazier than Reagan
• Less honest than Clinton.

In the clear light of hindsight, this was grossly unfair to GW Bush, who was not particularly egotistical or vindictive.  (Also to Ford, who was not stupid).  Instead, GW Bush's capital flaw (which was related to laziness and incompetence and made him appear dishonest) was that followed his gut-level instincts and treated facts and evidence as optional.  

And that, in turn, is an extreme version of a longstanding tendency among right-wingers toward anti-intellectualism and distrust of expertise.  And I can sort of understand it.  It is certainly annoying to be told "I know better than you."  When an expert is telling you something based on highly technical knowledge that you are not qualified to evaluate, you are being asked to rely on blind trust because you have no way of telling whether the person is being truthful or not.  Not to mention experts' frustrating tendency to disagree with each other, and not to be as infallible as they claim.  

And yet, in a society as complex as what we have now, there is really no choice but to rely on experts for many things.  

Furthermore, right-wingers let a somewhat understandable distrust of experts and expertise turn into a general distrust of learning, and a distrust of learning turn into a distrust of all knowledge, and a distrust of knowledge turn into a contempt for facts and evidence in favor of gut-level intuition.  And yes, I do understand that experts who focus on an exceedingly narrow specialty can develop a sort of tunnel vision.  Sometimes an outsider perspective and offer new ideas a specialist never thought of.  And (as I understand it), an inspired guess is recognized as a sometimes being a scientifically valid approach.  But the inspired guess is one made by someone familiar with the data, and has to be empirically tested to see its validity.

GW Bush and his supporter missed this critical part and relied on their gut-level intuitions that Saddam Hussein just had to be an intolerable threat, and removing him just had to work out well.  Wrong and wrong!  GW Bush lost all standing in the conservative movement as a result.

Unfortunately, the lesson that right-wingers took away from the Iraq debacle was not that gut-level intuition is no substitute for facts and evidence, but that GW Bush's gut level intuition was not good enough, and that they needed someone with better gut-level intuition.

So they chose Trump.

Trump Has Been Trumped!

 

Well, once again I don't have anything very original or in-depth to say about the war, but I do feel the need to post about it so here goes.

No TACO jokes

Yes, I have made a few myself, but in the end the point of TACO jokes is to goad Trump in persisting in a course of action that hurts him more than it hurts us -- tariffs, for instance.  This war is a different matter altogether.  While it would be good to have a leader with basic common sense, failing that I would rather have a leader who makes disastrously bad decisions and then backs away when they don't work out so well than a leader who makes disastrously bad decisions and keeps doubling down.

I will also say that when I fearfully peeked at the news over Tuesday, I came away with the distinct impression that a whole lot of people expected a TACO.  The markets were unhappy, but by no means panicked.  The top story on AOL was about Samantha Guthrie.  All sorts of normal news was being covered as if no disaster was at hand.  

The JCPO (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action)

There has been a lot of talk about Obama's Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JPCOA) -- the nuclear deal he struck with Iran, which reduced Iran's uranium enrichment, shipped most of its enriched uranium out of the country, and allowed intrusive inspections to ensure compliance.  Did it pave the way for war, or did abrogating it make war inevitable.  I don't think either.

Look, I am just going by my memories here and not doing extensive research.  But my clear memory is that the usual suspects -- Netanyahu, John Bolton, and the other warmongers -- were warning that Iran was on the verge of nuclear weapons, making cataclysmic predictions about what would happen, and loudly calling for large-scale bombing of Iran's nuclear facilities as the only option.  Admittedly they did sometimes distinguish between bombing and war by saying they were not calling for ground troops.  I even heard a revival of the old 1979 song, "Bomb Iran."

Then Obama and John Kerry came up with a proposal to actually keep Iran from getting nuclear weapons and they were outraged. I thought then and think now they were angry that their war was thwarted.  Of course, they gave other excuses like that the JCPOA did not make Iran give up missile or support for armed proxies and included some sanctions relief.  And they were outraged when Obama responded to their criticisms by defending the agreement instead of immediately conceding they were right and backing out.  But above all, they were outraged by the suggestion that rejecting the deal made war more likely.  How dare anyone call them warmongers just because they had been demanding war until the deal was struck?  

So, no, I don't think war was inevitable when Trump abrogated the deal.  We managed to get by for quite a few years with neither the deal nor war, and without Iran developing nuclear weapons.  But I do think that critics of the deal wanted war all along. Certainly that was the view of  Netanyahu, who proclaimed that it was Munich 1938 and that avoiding war now would only lead to a worse war later.

A different WWII analogy

Netanyahu may have thought the JCPOA was Munich and WWII must necessarily follow.  His decision to launch this war put me in mind of another WWII analogy -- Japan's actions.

My father likes to say that the Japanese got into a land war with the world's most populous country and found they couldn't win, so they started a naval war with the world's richest country.  Put that way, it sounds crazy.  But the Japanese blamed their inability to subdue China on interference by the US.  They thought that by bombing Pearl Harbor they could knock the US out of the war and finally beat China.  Needless to say, they seriously underestimated the US industrial base!

Well, in case nobody noticed, Netanyahu reduced Gaza to a pile of rubble and killed some 50,000 people out of a population of 2.3 million -- over 2% of the total -- and still couldn't root out Hamas.  Neither their brilliantly executed decapitation of Hezbollah, nor pounding much of southern Lebanon into rubble managed to root out Hezbollah.  Netanyahu blamed this on Iranian backing and thought he would go to the source.  It does not appear to have occurred to him that if he couldn't uproot an entrenched militia in a territory of 2.3 million people right on Israel's border, it might be even harder to root out the entrenched government of a country of 92 million people hundreds of miles away and well outside the reach of Israeli ground or even naval forces.

Trump was trumped

Up till now, Trump has run is foreign policy on the "madman theory."  If you act crazy enough, people will be afraid of you and stay out of your way.  It helps if you really are crazy.  Well, this time Trump ran into someone even crazier than he is.  It didn't go well for anyone.

We don't know why he backed down

It could have been outcry by MAGA influencers like Tucker Carlson and Alex Jones.  Or rumored reports of military lawyers pushing back against Trump's plans to focus on civilian targets.  Or rising gas prices and a falling stock market.  Or fear of the cycle of escalation that could follow any attempt to take down the Iranian power grid.  Or maybe he just got bored and wanted to move on.  

Am I the only one who suspects Trump sent Vance out of the country to keep him from invoking the 25th Amendment?

What next?

My guess is that Trump is thoroughly tired of this war and wants out.  And if he wants out, we will get out.  It is also clear that the cease-fire is operating sort of like the Gaza ceasefire or the ICE drawdown in Minneapolis -- extremely slow and incomplete, sometimes more a reduce-fire than a ceasefire, but ultimately a significant decline in violence.  It was also clear even before the ceasefire that Iran was quietly tiptoeing away from blocking the Straits of Hormuz into something more like controlling which ships it allowed access and charging for passage.  I may be over-optimistic here, but I do think all sides are exhausted and this will slowly sputter out into an uneasy truce with only sporadic violations.  I do not share the insane optimism of Wall Street, which thinks everything is back to normal now.  There has been real physical damage to oil infrastructure.  I certainly couldn't predict how long it will take to repair, but it seems safe to assume, not overnight.

In terms of proposals, the two sides seem hopelessly far apart, each making wholly unreasonable demands.  This is not great but not necessarily fatal.  Negotiators can keep fruitless talks as long as they want so long as the shooting stops, or at least substantially diminishes.

In terms of domestic politics, once we get out of the war, I imagine it will be soon forgotten by friend and foe alike, and Trump's approval ratings will improve somewhat.  But probably not by a lot, given that gas prices will probably take some time to come down.

Bad, Bad Leroy Brown

It's a strange thing, but when my fears and anxiety about Trump and our country's future were at their strongest, one of the things that most seemed to calm me down was endlessly watching the video of "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown."  I never quite understood what seems so soothing about the song, but now it finally comes to me.  In some corner of my mind, Leroy must have represented Trump, and the song was reassuring because eventually Leroy is defeated.  (Not that the man who beat him was necessarily any better).

Sherlock Holmes: A Scandal in Bohemia

 

Things have been anxious lately, so what do I do to be calm?  Read through the complete works of Sherlock Holmes, of course.  

We have gotten through Arthur Conan Doyle's first two novels -- A Study in Scarlet and Sign of the Four.  Next comes The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, a series of short stories.  In fact, although Doyle wrote a few more novels, he appears to have decided that the short story was truly his medium.

The first short story is A Scandal in Bohemia.  It introduces a character who has fascinated many later writers of adaptations -- Irene Adler.  For all that her character is played up in later adaptations, she appears in only one work, a short story.  Moreover, she and Holmes do not know each other.  They meet only three times, briefly, each time with one party in disguise and the other unaware.  Adler marries another man and the story ends with her flight.  She apparently dies some time later offstage under uncertain circumstances.  Watson refers to her as "the late Irene Adler, of dubious and questionable memory."  We do not find out what happened to her.  The story takes place in 1888 and she was born in 1858 making her 30 years old at the time, so she died prematurely.  Watson also emphasizes the Holmes never loved Adler.  Holmes knew love mostly as a motive for crimes.  But he did respect and admire her and refer to her as "the woman."

I suspect that Doyle first tried to end the series at the end of the last novel by marrying Watson off and having him move out.  It must be emphasized how much of an improvement this is in Watson's life.  When Watson first met Holmes, his health was in ruins and he was living on a military invalid pension, not knowing anyone in London, too ill to go out and with no one to visit him.  Watson had nothing to do but observe his roommate and learn about him.  With his marriage, Watson acquires not only a wife, but his own household.  Presumably he begins building a social circle.  He also returns to the practice of medicine.  In short, he has his life back.  But he can still drop in on Holmes.

Holmes' latest client calls himself a Bohemian nobleman, but Holmes recognizes him as the king.  (We are not told how, but he is six feet six inches tall, which must be distinguishing).  In this case, there is no murder and no mystery.  There is, I suppose, a crime, or several.  The circumstances are plain.  The king had an affair with an opera singer (now retired) named Irene Adler and was so indiscrete as to allow himself to be photographed with her.  He is now to marry a Scandinavian princess.  Irene Adler is threatening to reveal the photograph when the engagement is announced.  Paying blackmail is hopeless -- she doesn't want money; she wants to ruin him.  So blackmail is a crime, except that this is not exactly blackmail.  At least some of the king's attempts to get the photograph back also sound like crimes.  He has had people break into her house twice, diverted her luggage once, and waylaid her twice.  Hm.  The photograph is portrait sized and framed, so it is not something Irene Adler would hide on her person.

So, there is no mystery as to what happened.  The only mystery is how Holmes will find the photograph.

He disguises as a stable groom and mingles among the other stable grooms in the neighborhood to pick up the latest gossip about Irene Adler.  He also follows her when she goes to the Church of St. Monica and learns that she has gone there to marry her lawyer, Godfrey Norton!  The matter is so hasty and so secretive that the clergyman insisted on having a witness, and Holmes was the first person at hand to serve!  The marriage is secret, and the parties go their separate ways.  Holmes comments that the photograph is now a double-edged weapon.  Irene Adler presumably no more wants her husband to see it than the king wants his prospective wife to see it.  That the marriage takes place just as Holmes begins watching her seems like an extraordinary coincidence, but let that go.  Holmes still wants to find the photograph.

To do so, he enlists Watson in a obviously staged seen outside Irene's house.  A few street louts get into a fight just has Miss Adler steps out of her carriage.  Holmes, now dressed as a clergyman, rushes to her defense and falls to the ground, fake blood streaming from his face.  The brawlers run off, and some bystanders persuade Irene Adler to take Holmes into her sitting room.  He gestures her to open the window.  Watson waits outside with a smoke bomb to throw in.

I do not know whether he was seized with compunction at that moment for the part he was playing, but I know that I never felt more heartily ashamed of myself in my life than when I saw the beautiful creature against whom I was conspiring, or the grace and kindliness with which she waited upon the injured man. And yet it would be the blackest treachery to Holmes to draw back now from the part which he had intrusted to me. I hardened my heart, and took the smoke-rocket from under my ulster. After all, I thought, we are not injuring her. We are but preventing her from injuring another.

Watson throws the smoke bomb and cries fire.  A commotion ensues, in which Holmes escapes.  As they walk home, Holmes explains that when a woman thinks her house is on fire, she will reach for whatever she values most -- in this case, the photograph.  It was behind a sliding panel by the bell-pull.  Holmes did not take it because the coachman was watching him.  As they arrive home, an unknown passer-by said good night, and Holmes thinks the voice sounds familiar.

Early the next morning they summon the king and let him know of the situation.  The king is still clearly in love with Miss Adler.  He responds with jealousy when he hears about her marriage and insists that she cannot love her new husband.  Holmes points out that if she does, she will no longer have any reason to be jealous of the king's prospective marriage or to break it up.  They head to her house at 8:00 a.m., assuming she will not be up yet and they will be able to take the photograph.*  Upon arriving, however, they find that she has fled and taken the photograph with her.  Instead, she leaves a letter, in which she explains that the mysterious passer-by was her, in male disguise.  Recognizing how dangerous Holmes could be, she and her husband have fled with the photograph, which she will not reveal, but will keep as insurance if the king ever bothers he again.  In place of the photograph of herself and the king, she leaves a photograph of only herself.

The king assures them that they have nothing to fear, her word is inviolate.  Again, his admiration for her beauty, her intelligence, her resourcefulness, and her resolve make clear that the king is still in love with her.  "Would she not have made an admirable queen? Is it not a pity that she was not on my level?”  Holmes responds that she does, indeed, appear to have been on a very different level.  And he asks to keep the photograph and cherishes it in honor of the only woman to outwit him.

_____________________________________________

*What sort of hours did people keep in London at this time?  In the upcoming story The Speckled Band, Watson is awakened at 7:15 and thinks it outrageously early.  

PS

 Oh, yes and one other point about the war on Iran.  Not only does the Israel tail appear to be wagging the US dog, but the evidence rather strongly suggests that Trump and Netanyahu are working at cross purposes. 

 Trump's original goal appears to have been something like what we did in Venezuela -- leave the machinery of government in place and just change out the name at the top.  Trump's reasoning is that destroying the state can create a godawful mess.  We fired all of the Baathist Party in Iraq and they ended up turning into ISIS.  And much as I hate the man, he has a good point there.  As such, he would very much like to find someone he can make a deal with.

Netanyahu, by contrast, appears to want to destroy the Iranian state and doesn't care what a mess that creates.  Every time someone comes along who might make a deal, the Israelis kill him.  The goal appears to be to thwart any deal that could end the war until the Iranian state is destroyed altogether.

One would think that sooner or later, this will lead to conflict between the allies.

Not Very Original Thoughts on the Iran War

 

I don't have anything very original to say about the war in Iran, but it is hard to think about anything else these days, so let me offer some unoriginal thoughts.

Beware the cornered animal.

Obviously not an original observation, but Trump did not expect this kind of retaliation.  He did not expect it because he had hit Iran before, fairly hard, and not received a strong response.  In his first term, Trump killed Qassim Suleimani, head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and Iran made only the most token retaliation.  Last year he launched the 12 Days War to wreck Iran's nuclear program and Iran barely even made that.  This led Trump to assume that the Iranian regime was made of pushovers who would not strike back no matter what.  What he failed to take into account was the desperation of a government that truly has nothing to lose.  When you tell an enemy that you want their head on a platter and will not settle for anything less, you can expect an extremely hostile and belligerent response.  

Iran's response may be an extreme example, but the phenomenon is universal.  It is also a thing to keep in mind when we consider the merits of punishing Trump, his inner circle, and ICE.  Yes, they all richly deserve it, and yes, it has value as a deterrent.  But many a dictator has been allowed to escape punishment to avoid triggering the cornered animal response.  A thing to consider.

Harsh measures can strengthen resolve.  This cuts both ways.

By destroying the top leadership and making clear we considered the regime's existence unacceptable, we made it resolve to resist at all costs because there was no alternative.  Maybe the people will rise up if we destroy the Iranian military but spare civilian targets.  But heavy bombing is not normally conducive to domestic rebellion.

The same applies to Iran's opponents.  The Arabian Gulf states warned against war because they feared that they would be targets.  Now that they have been hit, Gulf Arabs are understandably furious at Iran. Iran hitting hotels and apartment buildings was a clear war crime.  Indeed, even the Iranian leadership appears to have recognized such strikes as counterproductive, apologized, and promised to stick to military targets. But even if we make the dubious assumption that the Iranians will keep their word, the Arabs are still in an extraordinarily awkward spot.  They invited US military bases to protect them from Iran.  The bases led them to be targeted.  But what choice do they have now?  If they kick the US out, they will be completely vulnerable to Iranian domination.  And this is to say nothing of Iran's attacks on Arab oil production.  The laws of war are unclear on the matter, and the devastating effect on Arab economies is all too obvious.  Again, Arabs are furious over this.

Israelis are also understandably furious.  And so is much of the rest of the world at seeing its economy attacked.  Which leads to a closely related point.

Wars like this are easier to get into than out of.

Look, given the balance of forces, it seems safe to assume we will eventually emerge with something that could be called victory.  My guess is that if there were a face-saving way for Trump to declare victory and stand down, he would take it.  The problem is that neither Iran nor Israel appears willing to agree to such an arrangement any time soon, and that so long as the opposing party is willing and able to strike back, the war is not ended.

Worse yet, things like this tend to spread.  After all, it is not just our economy that is being affected by this war; it is every oil importing economy across the world.  Given how Trump has been treating our allies, it is entirely understandable that they may not want to join us in forcing open the Straits of Hormuz.  Given the stakes, they may not have the choice.

Even worse -- we have used up so many anti-missile defensive weapons that we are being forced to move them out of South Korea.  It seems likely that the North Koreans will take advantage of the situation.  Suddenly, we are starting to get a WWIII vibe.

Russia

I don't believe that Trump undertook this war as a favor to his friend Pooty to build up Russia's war chest against Ukraine.  There would be easier ways to assist Putin, such as just lifting sanctions, cutting off intelligence sharing with Ukraine, or even directly assisting Russia.  All evidence points to Trump being genuinely caught off guard by spiking oil prices and wanting to bring them down.  That being said, he may very well view any advantage this war gives Putin as a side benefit.

Also, I don't think it is crazy to dismiss Russian intelligence assistance to Iran as an ordinary incident of war -- an expected response to our intelligence assistance to Ukraine.  And yes, the situations are comparable.  Russia is the aggressor in Ukraine.  We are the aggressor in Iran.  Both sides appear to be giving intel on appropriate military targets.  Admittedly, the Iranian regime is much worse than the government of Ukraine and more deserving of being overthrown.  But then again, the Russian homeland has been hit.  Ours has not.

So I understand Trump declining to be outraged over Russia's assistance to Iran.  On the other hand, all of this point to the strategic incoherence of pursuing a policy that is simultaneously pro-Russian and anti-Iran.  Maybe, just maybe, this war will drive home even to Trump the incoherence of such a policy.  That would be a good thing.  Unless it leads to WWIII.

Domestic politics.

Domestic politics clearly are a factor here.  This does not mean that the war is just a ruse to distract from the Epstein files.  The whole obsession with the Epstein files is just a replay of the error we made in Russiagate -- looking for the one silver bullet that will slay the Trump monster.  There is no such silver bullet.  But I do believe that Trump is focusing on foreign policy at least in part because of growing signs that his domestic power is slipping.  The Epstein files are part of that, but by no means all.  Consider:

• More and more material is being released from the Epstein files, including credible evidence that Trump physically and sexually assaulted a girl under 16.
• The House Oversight Committee has issued a bipartisan subpoena to Pam Bondi to testify about the Epstein files.
• High power law firms appear to be prevailing in their suit to keep Team Trump from punishing them for their opposition.
• Universities are also prevailing in their suits against Trump,
• The Supreme Court has largely blocked deployment of the National Guard without the consent of governors.
• The Supreme Court has also blocked Trump's tariffs, at least in their most arbitrary and capricious form.
• Prosecution of political opponents has failed.
• Anthropic is defying the Pentagon and taking it to court.
• Thus far, Senate Republicans are refusing to yield to Trump's pressure to block the filibuster to pass the SAVE Act.
• Republicans are clearly bracing for large-scale losses in the midterms.
• Opponents of ICE have landed their first Cabinet-level scalp in Kristi Noem.* Admittedly, her proposed replacement is not better, but we have proven that sufficiently intense and sustained outrage can remove a Cabinet Secretary, which may have an effect on her successor.
• ICE appears to be behaving marginally better, at least for now.

This is not to say that all is well.  ICE continues to expand in personnel, budget, prison network, and surveillance capabilities, and to treat opposition as terrorism.  Democracy is not safe until that ends.  And we don't yet know what tricks Trump has up his sleeve for the midterm elections, or how he will respond if he loses.

And let's face it.  This war just might be what Trump needs to revive his domestic fortunes.  Consider:

The war has proven to be expensive and Trump is seeking new funding.  Democrats have pledged to oppose it, but does anyone seriously believe that Congress will deny our troops funding for the munitions they need to defend themselves while they are being shot at?  Particularly if Iran shows no willingness to stop shooting?

The risk of Iranian terrorist attacks will massively increase pressure on Democrats to fund the Department of Homeland Security.  There have already been three terrorist attacks -- all apparently isolated instances not backed by the Iranian regime, but alarming nonetheless.

And there is some evidence that support for the war is rising and the rally-round-the-chief effect is taking hold.  And here is the thing.  A long, drawn-out war almost always becomes unpopular, but the effect can take years.  A quick and easy victory can give a leader a boost, but it is rarely more than a short-lived sugar high.  But US bases being attacked, troops being killed, terrorist attacks at home, and the like -- well, see the first point above about initial hardship strengthening resolve.  A serious war may be just what Trump needs to revive his domestic popularity.  Yes, it will eventually decline if the war drags on for years, but that is a remote concern.  And it may not last long after a successful conclusion -- see GHW Bush, Churchill, etc.  But that just gives Trump incentive to prolong the war, at least in the medium term.

Buckle up, folks.  Things could get rough.

______________________________________________

*Really, their second scalp counting Greg Bovino.  And there is a third scalp as well in that ICE Barbie appears to be taking her ICE Ken with her.  But Noem is the only Cabinet-level scalp so far.

So, How Does Trump Stack Up to Biden

Shortly after Trump was inaugurated, I reviewed this ridiculous article, claiming that any fears about Donald Trump's lawlessness were purely hypothetical, while Biden had already proven himself to be our most lawless President ever.  To make her point, the author compared Biden's actions to rash actions by previous Presidents, arguing that Biden was worse.  I do wonder what the author would say now that Trump has been in office long enough to allow a point of comparison.

Consider what the author argued:

Andrew Jackson: Defied a Supreme Court ruling seeking to protect the Cherokee Nation and paved the way for the Trail of Tears.
Joe Biden: When the Supreme Court struck down his student loan forgiveness, he looked for ways to modify it or expand existing programs to achieve his goal.
Trump II: When the Supreme Court struck down his unilateral tariffs, attempted to impose them under another statute.

(Um, does the author really thing that student loan forgiveness is worse that the Trail of Tears?!?!?  And even if she is only comparing them in the sense of being done in defiance of the Supreme Court, well, Trump has done much the same thing as Biden now).

Abraham Lincoln: Unilaterally suspended habeas corpus, ordered arrest of opponents in Congress and the media.
Joe Biden: Encouraged his Attorney General to indict Trump and taunted Trump when he was indicted.
Trump II: Pressured his Attorney General to indict at least three opponents and a Federal Reserve official. All attempts thrown out as baseless.

Woodrow Wilson: Palmer Raids, with some 6,000 opponents of US participation in WWI arrested.
Joe Biden: Harshly pressured social media to take down misleading posts about COVID.
Trump II: Masked thugs making sweeps and arbitrary arrests, indefinite detention. and a whole network of immigration prisons. Also had an FCC chairman threatening to take broadcasts off the air for news that displeased him.  And bases approval or disapproval of media mergers on promises to give favorable news coverage.
(The author somewhat grudgingly acknowledged that putting pressure on social media is not quite as bad as mass arrests on political grounds.  I wonder what she thinks of ICE).

Franklin Roosevelt: Made a serious threat to pack the Supreme Court.
Joe Biden: Appointed a commission to study proposals to pack the Supreme Court.
Trump II: Attempted to destroy the independence of the Federal Reserve.

Barrack Obama: Refrained from enforcing marijuana and immigration laws.
Joe Biden: Refrained from enforcing a TikTok ban that went into effect one day before he left office, when his successor made clear he wanted to have the chance make the decision.
Trump II: Shelved the Tik Tok ban altogether, even though the law is still on the books.
(And just for the record, none of these guys enforced marijuana bans).

George W. Bush: Signed a campaign finance law he admitted might be unconstitutional.
Joe Biden: Undertook action to forgive student loans, institute and eviction moratorium, and climate change action despite doubting his actions were constitutional, criticized the Supreme Court "in the most strident and partisan terms" when they struck down his actions.
Trump II: Unilaterally imposed tariffs and moved them around in a most arbitrary and capricious manner. Also criticized the Supreme Court in strident and partisan terms when they struck down his actions.
(Um, seriously, does the author think campaign finance was the worst thing Bush II did?  Black sites?  Torture memos?  Warrantless surveillance?  That all sounds a lot like Trump -- and not at all like Biden).

Donald Trump: Tried to overturn the election when he lost.
Joe Biden: "To his credit" did not try to overturn the election he lost, but did conceal his mental decline. And then there is the matter of his pardon of Hunter Biden and his attempt to declare the Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution ratified.
Trump II: Attempting to rig the midterm elections.

(Plus, stay tuned).

Trump and the Tariffs

Well, well, well, that didn't take long.  We are beginning to see some movement on item 6 of my list of signs that Trump's power is waning.  The Supreme Court struck down his unilateral tariffs.  Let's applaud them for that.  

Tariffs were definitely something that was worse than I expected.  I thought of tariffs as something that would damage the economy and thereby undermine Trump's power, but not a serious threat to democracy.  I was wrong.  Tariffs have proven much less damaging to the economy and more damaging to the rule of law than I anticipated.  I had not foreseen how incredibly arbitrary and capricious Trump would be in imposing tariffs as forms of punishment or coercion, or even pique.  And I failed to understand how much he would use them as a means of avoiding Congress's power of the purse strings.

So, good work, Supreme Court, in striking them down.  Trump is now proceeding under other statute, of which there are several, none allowing such complete abandon as Trump has been exercising.  The law he is currently applying limits import taxes to 15%, generally requires them to be broad and across the board, and to expire after 150 days unless extended by Congress.  150 days is about 5 months.  Five months from now will be late July.  The primary elections will be over and the midterms will be only a few months off.  I don't think Congress will extend the tariffs in late July.

Confession:  I haven't read the Supreme Court opinion yet.  Some time when I don't have anything better to do I will have to.

Latest on Trump's Power

I previously offered eleven signs to look for to suggest that Trump's power might be diminishing, or at least that he might be taking longer than he had hoped to consolidate it.

1. Media outlets bought by Trump allies are willing to criticize or oppose him;
2. Republicans in Congress splinter and Trump cannot bring them into line;
3. Attempts to target opposing organizations through taxes or RICO are thrown out, or never materialize;
4. Universities, high power law firms, and other institutions targeted by Trump start consistently defying him;
5. The Supreme Court makes a meaningful attempt to reign Trump in;
6. Democrats win control of the House and Trump cannot stop them;
7. Democrats win control of the Senate and Trump cannot stop them;
8. Growing numbers of state and local jurisdictions reject cooperation with ICE, putting more strain on the organization;
9. ICE starts losing personnel faster than it can recruit them and begins shrinking;
10. Trump supporters stop making death threats and harassment against people who he criticizes;
11. Big money interests start standing up to him.

Looking it over, I do want to make a few changes. More significant than continued media independence but less significance than loss of control over Republicans in Congress would be Trump losing control of Republicans at the state level.

And I really was too snarky in suggesting that the ultimate sign of his downfall would be defiance by big money interests. Certainly that would happen very late in the game, and only if big money interests were certain that Trump was finished. What will never end is death threats by a few supporters. No matter how unpopular Trump may become, in a country with a population over 300 million there will always be some supporters left. And it doesn't take many to be online terrorists.

So, by these new standards, where are we?

1. Media outlets bought by Trump allies are willing to criticize or oppose him. Look, I haven't been following all the in's and out's of CBS News or the Washington Post. Both, I realize, are failing because they are alienating their old audiences while being too establishment to attract new ones. But I do see critical stories in both.
2. State Republicans defy Trump. Indiana Republicans defied him in refusing to gerrymander. And now when Trump excluded Democrats from his meeting with the National Governor's Association, Oklahoma Republican Governor Kevin Stitt let it be known that Republican governors would not attend if their Democratic colleagues were not invited. Trump backed down. Stitt also criticized Trump's proposal to deploy the Texas National Guard to Chicago last October. An encouraging sign.
3. Republicans in Congress splinter and Trump cannot bring them into line. Well, Congressional Republicans famously revolted over the Epstein files. None House Republicans defied Trump to vote for Obamacare subsidies, although they did so with the knowledge that the measure would fail in the Senate. And six House Republicans voted against tariffs, a meaningless vote. Trump was still able to twist House Republican arms and get them to fund the government except Homeland Security. I suppose the real tests will be over voting restrictions and attempts to reign in ICE.
4. Attempts to target opposing organizations through taxes or RICO are thrown out, or never
   
   materialize. This one is a mixed bag, and a disturbing one. I think we can say that Stephen Millers "all of government" attempt to shut down the opposition has been dropped. At the same time, a very disturbing memo, alleging that "Antifa" was engaged in widespread terrorism, including "organized doxing of law enforcement, mass rioting and destruction in our cities, violent efforts to shut down immigration enforcement, targeting of public officials or other political actors." In terms of specific examples, the memo listed the assassination of Charlie Kirk, the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, and numerous actions opposing ICE. The memo called for federal law enforcement to review their files within 14 days and make a report, and for granted to local law enforcement to be conditional on cooperation against "terrorism."  It also called for setting up a tip line and cash rewards within 30 days and a report on "Antifa" and associated groups within 60 days.  Given the focus on doxing and obstructing law enforcement and anti-ICE actions, the memo gives the distinct impression that immigration advocates are the targets.  Terrifying reports are coming out about ICE spying on activists, and using social media and other internet tracking tools to evade the need for warrants.  Team Trump appears to have decided that dissent will be tolerated -- except in matters of immigration.
5. Universities, high power law firms, and other institutions targeted by Trump start consistently defying him.  Well, UCLA faculty and unions apparently won a victory on behalf of the university. Unions had an employee reinstated when he was fired for heckling Trump.  So some institutions are standing up to him. But not enough to make a trend.
6. The Supreme Court makes a meaningful attempt to reign Trump in.  The Supreme Court has made a bizarre ruling limiting Trump's ability to deploy the National Guard until the regular army has failed to keep order.  It doesn't make sense and seems like a potentially pyrrhic victory, but thus far it has prevented any further deployments of the National Guard.  The bad news:  ICE is effectively a paramilitary, not so well behaved as the National Guard.  On the other hand, ICE has a lot less personnel than the National Guard.  Coming up:  rulings on tariffs, Federal Reserve independence, and birthright citizenship.  Stay tuned.
7. Democrats win control of the House and Trump cannot stop them.  Clear attempts to rig the election by voting restrictions are underway.  Stay tuned.
8. Democrats win control of the Senate and Trump cannot stop them.  Ditto.
9. Growing numbers of state and local jurisdictions reject cooperation with ICE, putting more strain on the organization.  Newly elected Virginia Governor Abigail Spanberger has terminated state police agreements with ICE, but allows local police to continue such agreements.  I recall hearing a Maine sheriff recently breaking up with ICE after they targeted one of his deputies, but cannot find the link.  These are promising but still fall well short of a trend.
10. ICE starts losing personnel faster than it can recruit them and begins shrinking.  One hears about discontent in the ranks, but none of that has actually led to widespread resignations.  The Department of Justice, by contrast, has seen widespread resignations, to the extent that its is experiencing serious personnel shortages and being limited in its ability to function.  The federal prosecutor in charge of Somali fraud investigations is actually representing Don Lemon!  So the federal government is actually seeing a reduction in its coercive power -- just not where it matters.
11. Big money interests start standing up to him.  No.  If Trump's power collapses, this will be a very late sign.
12. Trump supporters stop making death threats and harassment against people who he criticizes.  Ain't gonna happen, for the reasons discussed above.