When I saw the title of the column The beginning of the end of Trumpism by E.J. Dionne, Jr., a Washington Post opinion writer whose political opinions I respect, I experienced a glimmer of hope. As you can see below it was the lead opinion column on the main page (upper left):
Then I read the column. I was sorely disappointed. He came nowhere near making a case that the impeachment vote was the beginning of the end of Trumpism.
Here are excerpts from E.J. Dionne, Jr’s’ Washington Post column with my comments in italics.
You can tell how worried Republicans are that they are now the Trump Party by the contortions of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, who aided Trump almost to the end. Rarely has a politician been more blatant in attempting the impossible feat of running with the foxes and hunting with the hounds.
His words told the world who won the argument. They also underscored how wrenching it will be for Republican politicians to appease the GOP’s Trump-supporting majority while pretending to be another party altogether.
Here’s another contradiction. McConnell’s words told the world who won the argument but what the world thinks is largely irrelevant to Republican voters who follow Trump like a tail follows a dog.
The case for ending the filibuster is now overwhelming. There are not 10 Republican Senate votes to be had on anything that really matters.
All the Republicans who broke with Trump deserve honor and respect. Unfortunately, it’s hard to see how this varied group could either form the core of an alternative kind of Republicanism or be consistent governing partners with Biden.
Again this is another example of how Trumpism “supposedly” won the day.
It’s a sign of how far and how fast the ex-president has fallen that opponents of impeachment rationalized their votes by saying, as McConnell did, that Trump must still confront the “criminal justice system” and “civil litigation.” You’re in trouble when your would-be friends are saying you should be prosecuted rather than impeached.
Here’s my view of McConnell’s messaging about what he feels about the Devil Trump: Hearts or arrows...
While down the road it it may turn out that Trump’s acquittal could represent the beginning of the end of Trumpism, it may also prove to be the beginning of the resurgence or Trumpism. For example, we are already seeing articles like “Lindsey Graham: Burr impeachment vote boosts Lara Trump Senate hopes” in the Guardian.
Richard Burr’s vote to convict Donald Trump did not bring down the former president but it may have made Lara Trump “almost certain” to be nominated for the US Senate, key Trump ally Lindsey Graham said on Sunday.
“Certainly I would be behind her because she represents the future of the Republican party,” the South Carolina senator said of the former president’s daughter-in-law, adding that the future should be “Trump-plus”.
Burr, a former chair of the Senate intelligence committee, will retire as a senator from North Carolina at the end of his current term.
Dionne doesn’t even begin to make the case for saying the vote is the beginning of the end of Trumpism. If anything he suggests the opposite. In fact not once in his column does he refer to the beginning of the end of Trumpism. He’s doesn’t even use the word Trumpism.
Could this be the case of someone else writing the title? It could be someone who may not have even carefully read the column. I suppose so. In this case it is the fault of the Washington Post.
If Dionne wrote the title then I think he tried to find some lemons in how a few Republicans voted in impeachment trial and to make lemonade out of them. I am afraid that no amount of sugar added to the few lemons he found would be enough too make even a small glass of lemonade.
If he believes it I think he’s a cockeyed optimist.