Marble Falls The thing to remember about power, is that even when you have some, it’s critical to remember that it’s never absolute, because there are always limits. This lesson is being taught, even if not learned, between the White House and the Congress, as well as globally with Trump’s fiasco in Iran.
With Iran, Trump’s back and forth, threatening and exaggerating, one day war, the next ceasefire, and so on, and so on is a case study of a megalomanic narcissist of lessons unlearned when a president, even in arguably the most powerful position in the world, speeds past the limits of power crashing into the wall. Millions upon millions of spectators feel the impact of such an obvious disaster, even as Trump flails around impotently to resolve fights that he started foolhardily.
Domestically, Trump is also paying a price, ironically, but well-deserved, for his arrogance in trying to unseat incumbent representatives and senators, especially in what may be the last months when his party controls both houses of Congress. Like Iran, even while claiming to be a winner, that doesn’t mean that the losers rollover without snapping back. US Senators are especially prickly, because there are fewer of them. Trump’s endorsement of primary winners over sitting senators in Texas and Louisiana, as well as his problems in North Carolina are nothing but trouble for his policies and appointments now that he has embittered prideful folks in the last months of their service.
Reportedly, Texas Senator Cronyn has extracted promises for AIDS funds and more for his votes on some issues and is angling to leverage what power he has left against Trump’s attorney general nominee in exchange for deeper burial of the $1.7 billion slush fund Blanche had tried to create for Trump and his cronies. Louisiana Senator and doctor Cassidy, also deposed by a Trump nominee, has used what he has left to force promises from a prospective nominee for the Center for Disease Control (CDC) in exchange for a return to a more rational vaccine policy. North Carolina’s Senator has promised not to negotiate at all in joining others to prevent Trump’s faux election reform efforts. Trump asked for these problems from unforced errors where he meddled with, rather than managing, the less powerful, while forgetting or ignoring the fact that they were still not powerless.
A challenge for all of us is what can you do with what small table stakes you have, when negotiating with someone who always operates in bad faith? He makes a deal with Saudi Arabia, and then adds a condition once it’s done. Congress passes something, and then his administration denies funding, redirects funding, or just doesn’t implement the funding in order to thwart Congressional actions and subsume them within the executive. There’s not even a pretense of good government and benefits for all, when the administration withholds funding simply because a state didn’t vote for Trump in 2024, thereby punishing its people.
One Senator mocks the lame ducks and the deals they are trying to make with the administration by noting that Trump’s record of bad faith means these agreements are worthless. They in turn quack that with even their lesser power, they still have cards to play. Meanwhile, we’re watching from the cheap seats in fear and wonder realizing that there is no way to predict the outcome, when the game is so clearly rigged by the house.