Here’s the thing: I agree that he’s already fed up with the job. He thought he’d get sworn in, go to the Oval Office, issue a few orders and edicts, and make it out to the links for his regular tee-time. Instead he is hitting obstruction at every turn (which is kind of normal in that job), not to mention ridicule, and even hatred, except from his loser supporters (and I suspect even he is starting to see them as losers).
I believe it is possible that he might just walk away
IF He can do it WHILE STILL SEEMING TO BE A WINNER. This is essential.
Consider the following:
1)He is obsessed with being seen as a winner, as evidenced by the constant harping on vote count, both in the election and even in the N.H. primary.
IMHO he cannot be successfully challenged head-on to leave the job. I think the head-on challenges, demonstrations, ridicule, satire, etc., should continue, first, for their nuisance value, and second, to show the Republicans in Congress that Trump’s very presence is an obstacle to **their **agenda. When that gets bad enough and individual members of Congress start to feel the heat from down home, that might lead to pulling support from Trump.
Above all, he must be able to blame someone else (anyone else-- the Republicans, the Democrats, the media, women, the beached whales, the NFL, immigrants, ANYONE) for not being able to get the job done. This will be tricky, because Obama got a LOT done while being constantly blocked. But then Obama was a pretty smart, cool customer. Trump is a mentally and emotionally challenged hothead.
Trump needs to be able to say to himself, *"I was going to make America great again, and I know I was the only one who could do it. But *<bad guys> wouldn’t listen to me. They wouldn’t get on board. So I’m not going to waste my time with those losers anymore!"
IOW in order for him to walk out still a WINNER!!<crowd goes wild>, **everyone else has to be a loser. **
If he could be made to see quitting as just another failed business projects where he can give himself a golden parachute and stick someone else with the bill, I bet he’d quit just like he quits on his bankruptcies. He’ll just tell himself that it’s all just business and he’s the smart one because he got out with the money and his fans will all still love him, anyway, and cheer for him at his rallies (cause he’s not going to give up his cheering section.) Once his companies start losing real money, he’s out.
He’s not connected to reality. As long as he insists that he’s a winner, it’s all good. And he’ll still be called Mr. President until the day he dies, so what does he care?
We could probably swing it so that he’d say that he has to leave to step in and rescue his poor little girl’s company. It’d probably be cheap for us, in the long run.
This is already happening, and we’re not even a month into the Trump Administration.
Jason Chaffetz faced a very angry crowd at a town hall meeting on Thursday night. And this is in Utah, among the reddest of red states. The article notes that several other congressmen have faced similar angry crowds, or cancelled public appearances to avoid such crowds.
I wonder though… there’s fooling yourself, and then there’s fooling history. The first is a whole lot easier than the second. If it looks like he’s going down in history as an incompetent version of Nixon, will he be able to live with that?
Either way, if he really wants to leave the office in a way that makes him look like a tragic hero, there’s nothing to stop him from spending the rest of his term daring congress to shitcan him. He could start doing more and more outrageous things, flouting the law ever more blatantly until they have no choice, being mired in investigations and inundated by constant angry phone calls from constituents. It would be very bad for the country, but probably his best bet to salvage some kind of non-terrible legacy (still probably won’t work, but if it’s his only play I wouldn’t be surprised to see him try it).
My crystal ball is cloudy, unfortunately it was on the blink during the campaign also. So who knows, but basically I’d say the predictions of Trump quitting now and those of him quitting during the campaign have a one huge thing in common which outweighs the distinctions you’ve made: wishful thinking by people also looking at the news through a friendly filter.
Along with the general wishfulness, there was also during the campaign an assessment of how his campaign was going which exaggerated his setbacks and underestimated his prospects. A common theme here was how he was going to quit to avoid humiliation in a landslide defeat. After the election the debate seamlessly shifted to pointing out how narrow a win it was, true enough in itself, but ignoring how out to lunch the prediction of crushing defeat had been, based on wishes and a filtered view. I think it’s basically the same now for people thinking there’s any real likelihood of him quitting based on what’s happened so far. Although it’s true 4 yrs is a long time, and Trump is quite the bull in china shop. So who knows, eventually.
It’s a ridiculous idea. Note that Trump can delegate as much as he wants. Steve Bannon or Mike Pence or a number of others in his administration would be willing to make all the decisions–leaving Trump to make some speeches and sign laws.
I could see it. I’ve thought all along that his ego was very much in love with the idea of “President Donald J. Trump” but would quickly sour on actually being President Donald J. Trump.
Trump, being the narcissistic asshole that he is, spends much of his day obsessively watching the news and responding in real time via twitter against any perceived insults or criticism leveled against him. He doesn’t have the mental acuity to delve and understand any topic or policy in sufficient detail in order to be an effective leader. So he’ll delegate tasks to various staffers and will likely delegate the same task to multiple staffers causing chaos and infighting, resulting in one embarrassing failure after another.
His presidency will be plagued by incompetence, chaos, rotating door staffing and failed policy after failed policy. Absolutely nothing will get done and he’ll spend every single moment blaming everyone else for his every failure.
But he won’t quit until he’s forced to do so or is shown the door. It seems unlikely that he’ll last the full 4 year term. I’m still hoping that the stress of what’s to come actually kills that orange jackass.
Republicans are trying to tell themselves that all of those people at the angry town halls are Democrats and sore losers. But if you read the stories, while many of them are Democrats, a fairly large number of them are Republicans who don’t like their reps being lock-step with Trump while refusing to investigate any wrong-doing or to hold anyone accountable.
I don’t think you can over-estimate the importance of this: he will be called “Mr. President”* for the rest of his life, no matter what the circumstances of his departure. No one can take this evidence of being a winner away from him. It’s like baptism-- leaves an indelible mark on your soul.