If I’m playing the red pieces, one problem on my horizon is the Dems’ upcoming use of the House to investigate the very target-rich environment of the Trump Administration.
My recollection is that in 2007-2008, there were a fair number of times when the Bush Administration and its officials simply refused to respond to Congressional subpoenas. And the push-comes-to-shove reality of the situation was, Congress had no means of enforcing the subpoenas. Sure, they could hold Bush officials in contempt of Congress (I don’t think they bothered to go that far) but that isn’t self-enforcing either. Once someone is found to be in contempt of Congress, the matter is turned over to the US Attorney for the District of Columbia to bring the charge before a grand jury, but any enforcement relies on the willingness of the US Attorney to take it from there. (2007-2008 explainer on contempt of Congress here; a more thorough Wikipedia treatment here.)
So if I’m playing the red pieces, I can limit the efficacy of Congressional investigations to pulling together and highlighting what is already known.
My response if I’m playing the blue pieces is to (a) hold in contempt of Congress any and all Trump Administration officials who refuse to fully cooperate with subpoenas, and (b) let them know that if the current US Attorney fails to follow through on taking the officials to court, the House will refer the matter to the new US Attorney in the next Administration - that there ain’t gonna be no bygones this time, none of this “look forward, not back” shit. So they can testify now, or spend some time in the slammer in 2021-22.
If I’m playing the red pieces, my bet is that the Dems won’t play hardball to the extent of threatening to follow through with the contempt charges with the US Attorney in the next Administration. (If I had to bet, that’s easily the side of the bet I’d take, dammit. :mad:**) So assuming a pliant US Attorney now - if not, fire the one who’s there, and use the Vacancies Act to move the most pliant of the current US attorneys to DC - I can probably minimize the extent of the exposure to PR damage due to Congressional investigations.
I think a lot depends on geography. Florida Republicans are probably pretty happy, Nevada Republicans not so much.
I work with two people who are former GOP Texas state representatives, and they were sort of ambivalent about the results here. Beto lost, but he came a lot closer than they expected him to (they thought that race was all hype and Cruz would end up winning by at least 10 points). Some of the other statewide races were likewise closer than you might have expected and there were some blue shifts in traditional Republican counties, the Dems beat a dozen state reps, a couple of state senators and a surprising number of appellate court judges. Overall they thought it was an okay night though, they’re not panicked or anything. They did seem to think that maybe a little less focus on bomb-throwing social issues and more focus on solid conservative government is probably in order, especially in suburbia.
This went pretty much as it would be expected for a midterm with an underwater president to go and the GOP knows that. They cannot be thrilled that the House popular vote in Texas was only 3.6%. But it could have been worse and very nearly was.
But playing the pieces depends on what happens from here. I hope the economy holds but the simple fact is that no matter who is charge and what they do it is due to fall off, and with what Trump has done any fall is likely to go hugely. If that happens it is a different checkers board.
Trump will keep his solid bottom of upper 30s no matter what comes out as long as the economy is continuing its long recovery. In that case yes the House’s power to subpoena is constrained by the the US Attorney’s office having some sense of ethics and impeachment accomplishes naught with the Senate how it is.
Again, hoping for the economy to stay okay. But if it does not hold then his popularity drops to late Nixonian levels and his party no longer supports him.
It seems that the Republican party has accepted that it is now the Trump party, and it has also accepted a new reality in which it continues to make good on its Faustian bargain in order to keep its 35-40% of the electorate that will vote for him no matter what. On the surface it seems like an easy win for Democrats, but the Republicans will aim to exploit fissures among the left.
And the GOP will attempt to win by using foreign (Russian, Saudi) espionage, money and propaganda, as well as a combination of voter suppression, refusal to certify election results, gerrymandering, and other anti-democratic means.
I can’t see how the Pubs could interpret the mid-terms as anything but a huge victory. They spent the last two years bending over backwards to appease a hateful narcissist, presiding over one of the least competent and least effective governments we’ve ever seen, and completely failing to accomplish things they have been promising us for the better part of the decade. And yet tens of millions of people still turned out to vote for them.
It genuinely doesn’t matter what they do. They could do anything they want or nothing at all. Their voters will still vote for them, no matter what.
Not just that, the gop have cheated the system so much that the only time they lose is during a landslide.
The democrats won 2018 by a bigger margin than the gop won in 2010, but the gop won twice as many seats.
The democrats won fewer house seats in the federal house by winning by 9% than the gop won in 2012 by losing the election by 1%.
The gop have rigged elections so well via gerrymandering, the urban/rural divide, voter suppression, etc. that they know they’ll win the house back in 2022. I doubt they care much.