Another Trip to Fantasy Land

Trump's recent behavior, particularly with regard to the war in Iran, siding with Russia over Ukraine, and escalation in ICE is most alarming.  Worse still, even if Democrats win the midterms by a landslide and successfully take office, it is not clear to me what they can do to stop him.  The President is largely unconstrained in foreign policy, and ICE has a large enough war chest to keep going for years.  

I don't see how anything short of impeachment can stop him.  Nor do I see any prospect that Republicans would vote for removal, at least in sufficient numbers to convict.  And even if we manage to remove him, JD Vance is next in line and would be, if anything, even more hardcore on immigration and siding with Russia over Ukraine than Trump.  (He might get out of Iran, though).  

Still, let me indulge another fantasy.  Imagine that before the election, or at least before the next Congress is inaugurated, something comes out that is so explosive that no one (even the people who might stage a coup on behalf of Trump) can defend it.  Democrats win by a sweeping landslide, and there is little doubt that they can actually impeach and remove.  We will have to implicate Vance in this as well as Trump.  Speaker Mike Johnson comes forward and warns Trump and Vance that they have a choice -- step down now and let Johnson take over, or be impeached under the Democrats and let Hakeem Jeffries take over.  Assuming that Trump and Vance are not public-spirited enough to care (a plausible assumption), Johnson offers a sweetener.  He will pardon Trump, Vance, and anyone else they want pardoned.  Jeffries is unlikely to do the same.  Trump and Vance step aside (either by resignation or allowing impeachment to go through).  

Johnson becomes President.  What would I expect of him.

Well, it is my longstanding rule that I prefer an unprincipled opportunist to a dogmatic ideologue because the opportunist can be expected to back down from the worst policies if it is in his interest.  I am not sure which category JD Vance belongs to, but I am quite certain Johnson is an opportunist.

As such, I would expect him to back away from Trump's pro-Russia policies because they are unpopular.  I would expect him to somewhat soften Trump's deportation policies at least to what the Department of Homeland Security prefers(!).  And I would expect him to stop openly antagonizing allies, drop Trump's baseless prosecution against enemies, tiptoe away from Trump's vanity project and behave like a normal person.  All distinct positives!

I would not expect a President Johnson to walk away from the war with Iran.  And I would certainly expect him to follow the usual Republican program of cutting taxes in the top brackets, undermining social spending, rejecting economic and environmental regulations, preferring fossil fuels to alternative energy, wrecking government programs through corruption and incompetence, backing the police unless they target in-groups, distrusting allegations of racism, and playing up culture war issues.  The usual stuff, except for the war in Iran, -- bad but not deadly.  He would probably also support government's expanding surveillance powers, which really is dangerous.  I have no idea what he would do about tariffs or inflation.  And I would expect him not to have anything close to Trump's egregious corruption, but to turn a blind eye on corrupt practices by subordinates.  I would expect Johnson to be much less cooperative with Democrats investigating Trump's abuses than a President Jeffries, not as uncooperative as Trump.  And I would expect him to veto Democratic legislation intended to curb future abuses.

In short, I would expect a President Johnson to be a fairly standard Republican.

While I think that most members of Team Trump are unprincipled opportunists who could settle down they considered it in their interest, there are four who I consider to be dogmatic ideologues and extremely dangerous -- Pete Hegseth, Stephen Miller, Russ Vought, and RFK, Jr.  My advice to a hypothetical President Jeffries would be to fire these four, even if you lack the political capital to fire anyone else.  I would expect a President Johnson to fire Pete Hegseth, who botched a war, and RFK, Jr., who is a threat to public health.  I would expect him to keep Stephen Miller.  He might try to reign Miller in a little, but Johnson is basically a weak man an easily dominated, so I do not think the attempt would go well.  And I would expect him to keep Vought on because he agrees with Vought's anti-spending policies.  Most Republicans do.

I suppose I should also give some though to a President Vance.  This is a realistic possibility, since it is certainly possible that Trump might die or become incapacitated before the end of his term. But some thoughts are too depressing to face.