Maybe, but if so, the only victims of this ruse have been on his own side. I don’t think there is any question that his gambit has accomplished plenty of useful things—useful for the Democrats, that is. So far, he has handed the Democrats control of the Senate and a blank check to crack down on conservatives with the Capitol riots. He has also placed our chances of taking back Congress in 2022 in serious jeopardy.
And honestly, based on everything I’ve seen so far, this isn’t a strategy, it’s a tantrum. Unfortunately, he isn’t man enough to take responsibility for his own failure. He can’t face the truth, so he makes up excuses, shifts the blame to others, and constructs a fantasy where he didn’t actually lose. In the process, he has abused the trust of millions of his followers who now believe the same fantasy. It’s pathetic.
[Maybe, but if so, the only victims of this ruse have been on his own side. I don’t think there is any question that his gambit has accomplished plenty of useful things—useful for the Democrats, that is.]
They may be underestimating Trump. He may have done this in order to purge anyone not on board with his agenda from the GOP. That may be the gambit* they hadn’t reckoned on. If he manages to end McConnell’s** and Cheney’s respective political careers when their respective party primaries come about, he will have done the GOP and the nation a great service. Purging them from the party leadership would be a good first step.
The idea that a bunch of unarmed demonstrators doing their version of Occupy Wall Street on Capitol Hill represents an insurrection just doesn’t hold up upon inspection. The Big Lie can work in limited circumstances, but this is really stretching it. Even the Reichstag fire involved a gutted German Parliament building.
* The risk to Trump, of course, was that he would be cast out into the political wilderness, on top of the humiliation of being impeached again and convicted. Much as many of the professional pols in the Senate would love to eliminate the party favorite and rival from 2024’s White House race - the question is whether they want to risk ending their political careers.
Sassy has a very high opinion of himself. But Bob Corker had a similar victory margin in TN’s 2012 Senate race. He quit rather than be humiliated in 2018, when Trump actively opposed his re-election effort.
** McConnell, in particular, is literally in hock to the Chinese Communist party through his father-in-law.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foremost_Group
China has financed the building of the entire Foremost fleet. China can ban the Chao family’s ships from its ports. This would be a death blow, given that the vast majority (72%) of those ships service trade with China.