The long term effect of the failed Trump presidency?

[Jolly_Penguin]

I recall a few people during the election season, myself included, wondering if a brief Trump presidency could act as a "scorched earth" scenario, destroying the politics in Washington as we new it and creating space for non-mainstream politicians. I imagined the decimation of Hillary's corporate democrats may put more people in Bernie's socialist democrat camp, and I think it has, with Bernie now the most popular politician in the USA. I imagined the Democratic party shifting accordingly, but I don't think that has happened, at least not yet, because the corruption and big donor money is just too strong. I imagined that the Republicans may take a licking from this and create an opening for the Democrats (the Bernie type ones) to sweep in at the next election and then get some real progress happening. I don't see that happening. Democrats are actually still as a group rated very low in the opinion polls, even as Trump burns the whitehouse down, again maybe because the Democrat party refuses to evolve.

What do you think the long term effect of the Trump presidency will be on US politics? Will US politics look substantially different a decade from now than it would have had Hillary won? Will Democrat politics look different? Will Republican politics look different?

 

[Artemus]

I anticipate that right-wing talk radio and the tea-party will have (much?) less influence than they did. I've already seen some sign that at least some people are slowly but surely realizing that they were duped...Obama wasn't evil incarnate and Trump wasn't the savior of the country. After a few years many will be claiming that they never supported Trump in the first place. That will be good thing.

I also expect (or maybe just hope) that the political parties will retake control of the process to determine their own candidates. The primaries used to have far less overall impact on the decision, but the way it is now an populist idiot with a tiny plurality can become the front runner. I doubt that either party will let a fiasco like this happen again.

 

[starwater]

It will take awhile for the crash and burn to happen and the consequences of this fiasco to seep down to the great unwashed. I think there will still be those who will surmise that this was the elite Washington taking down an outsider because he was unwanted.

 

[Harry Bosch]

My sense is that there are a lot of Bernie or Bust people who greatly wished that they had effectively voted. There's nothing to cheer here: the Trump presidency has been a calamity for many, and will continue to hurt many.

 

[hurtinbuckaroo]

I also expect (or maybe just hope) that the political parties will retake control of the process to determine their own candidates. The primaries used to have far less overall impact on the decision, but the way it is now an populist idiot with a tiny plurality can become the front runner.

But that control was one of the things that made the populist idiot appealing.

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

We are in uncharted territory. Making predictions is a fool's errand. If Trump fails utterly, it could make way for the hard right, think Ted Cruz, or the Bernie Birds to rise. It all depends on how bad Trump fails and how. There is a lot of ferment going on in the Democratic Party - Independents, but there seems to be no real leader, plan or strategy, so they may just in the end, fail to gain traction against the hard right. A true and obvious failure if Trump - GOP will lead to political chaos and who knows what the near term result would be. Or long term result. I could see an impeachment of Trump raising resentment among conservatives to a white hot level, and the right vowing revenge. Or on the other hand, attacks on health care, EPA, FDA et al causing a nasty backlash. But it is way too early to say just what will happen in the next two years.

 

[rousseau]

To me it looks like the historical cultural development of the U.S. has led it too far to the right, and that's had some serious consequences on the structure of your country today. And the problem now is that your political spectrum is too far to the right to seriously deal with your issues. Trump isn't a cause of this, he's a symptom. Your crazy ass politicians who consistently make bad decisions actually have public support.

In the long run the only problem is that you're not moving fast enough to react to globalisation and automation, and a lot of your populace is being left in the lurch.

 

[prideandfall]

What do you think the long term effect of the Trump presidency will be on US politics?

the current trend will be further solidified of republicans circling the wagons and defending and supporting each other totally regardless of merit or circumstance, with barely any voices of dissent ever speaking against the party agenda.
this will continue to compel the GOP to be a single unified entity that votes lock-step on every issue brought forward, and since every single governmental idea the GOP has is horrendous bullshit seemingly designed specifically to destroy the US as we know it, that will just keep on happening in little drips and drabs like has been happening for the last 40 years.

the democrats will continue on as they have been since at least the early 90s: generally progressive in a milquetoast sort of way but at least ostensibly trying to govern a first world country and addressing current real problems in order to further the continued development of our society, while getting zero credit from anybody for being the only thing keeping this nation from imploding and being shit on constantly by the entirety of the right (for being the opposing town's sports team basically) and a fair chunk of the left (because they're "not left enough").

(seriously people, the democrats are FINE - sure they're not a bastion of liberal utopia and they may not vigorously spearhead some of the cultural shit super lefties would like to see, but jesus fuck they're on the correct side of like 90% of the issues that really matter and they're at least trying to actually run the country. get the fuck over yourselves already.)

Will US politics look substantially different a decade from now than it would have had Hillary won?

not substantially... it'll just continue on as it has been for the last few decades: the GOP continues to be Twisty the Clown - where everyone with two functioning brain cells and a piece of lint to rub together runs screaming, but endless teeming hordes of the mentally retarded keep clapping and hiring them to look after their children at birthday parties, so we just have to keep dealing with him.
and the democrats will generally sort of fix enough of what the GOP rapes so that the country doesn't completely shut down, but does it meekly and by constantly apologizing for itself.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

It is impossible to say what harm was done. What Trump did was unprecedented, so he either changed the system forever or he is simply an aberration.

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

Down here in Texas, the state version of the Freedom Caucus, thwarted in their goal of passing extremist right bills, used their power to kill 100 bills up for consideration by the GOP dominated Texas legislature. I do not see a united GOP front any time soon. And of course the Congressional "Freedom Caucus" has done their best to tie the GOP into knots in a grotesque show of "rule or ruin". I do not see a united GOP any time soon. Most of these clowns have safe seats and see themselves as having a mandate to get their way come hell or high water.

Here in Texas, there has been an old political jargon term for these sorts of people. Cockroaches. As the saying goes, its not what they carry away that matters. It's what they get into and mess up.

 

[Artemus]

I also expect (or maybe just hope) that the political parties will retake control of the process to determine their own candidates. The primaries used to have far less overall impact on the decision, but the way it is now an populist idiot with a tiny plurality can become the front runner.

But that control was one of the things that made the populist idiot appealing.

The republican party leadership didn't want Trump, for exactly the reasons we are seeing now. They just recognized that they couldn't keep him from getting the nomination. I expect them to have a large number of "super-delegates" by the next election.

 

[braces_for_impact]

This question is a good one, and I kind of agree with Cheerful Charlie and his cheerful news that we're in uncharted waters with no map. I was initially thinking somewhat along the lines of the OP, but as dysfunctional as the Republicans are, in lots of ways so are the Democrats. There's a LOT of anger out there towards Trump right now, and the Dems just cannot tap into it for any useful purpose that I can see. They're still bland, uninspiring and frankly, they're just afraid Bernie's going to run again.

For all their talk of being the party for working Joe Sixpack, and talking how they would like to be that party, they've done little to nothing to SHOW they're committed to turning away form their corporately owned base. Of course, part of that is because it's something that's difficult to do when you have almost no power in any branch of government at the moment. Still, there's really no one standing out from the crowd for Dems, making good points, beating the drum, and channeling the immense anger out there. They're just flat. Trump is just awful, simply awful, but one thing he isn't is boring.

 

[funinspace]

It’s complicated.

I recall a few people during the election season, myself included, wondering if a brief Trump presidency could act as a "scorched earth" scenario, destroying the politics in Washington as we new it and creating space for non-mainstream politicians. I imagined the decimation of Hillary's corporate democrats may put more people in Bernie's socialist democrat camp, and I think it has, with Bernie now the most popular politician in the USA. I imagined the Democratic party shifting accordingly, but I don't think that has happened, at least not yet, because the corruption and big donor money is just too strong. I imagined that the Republicans may take a licking from this and create an opening for the Democrats (the Bernie type ones) to sweep in at the next election and then get some real progress happening. I don't see that happening. Democrats are actually still as a group rated very low in the opinion polls, even as Trump burns the whitehouse down, again maybe because the Democrat party refuses to evolve.

At this point, I’d say there are so many variables, that projecting how the politics will play out in 2018 and 2020 is a fool’s errand. The big money will keep the Dums in check, short of some dramatic events. How the Repugs handle the debt ceiling issue that has to be dealt NLT around September should be telling of just how much they can actually do. I don’t see FFvC having much impact on getting major budgetary changes thru Congress, so I expect minor tinkering here and there. I suspect that the military will only get modest spending increases after the 1st year. I think 2 things will drive the elections more than anything else: (1) any emergent recession; (2) government health care funding spinning apart & lack of insurance via the ACA. Congress can pretty much kick the can down the road for most everything else. But ignoring the issues around the health care exchanges won’t make the growing issues go away. Of course, El Cheeto could always do something crazy and get us into another war, laying waste to most all projections…

What do you think the long term effect of the Trump presidency will be on US politics? Will US politics look substantially different a decade from now than it would have had Hillary won? Will Democrat politics look different? Will Republican politics look different?

Hard to say about a decade from now, but SS funding issues should start burning hotter by then. The SSA is still positing that their numbers are good until 2034, but it doesn’t look like they have adjusted for the DI portion garnering a higher portion of the payroll tax, as it’s ‘trust fund’ pot ran dry last year. The CBO says the big year is now 2029 based its models.

The hard part for the Dums is how to impact voters with an attention span of a squirrel, regarding complicated issues. How to get people to understand the feeding the 600-lb. military-complex is not helping them. How to get Joe-six pack to not fear boogie men behind every bush. How to deal with ever increasing automation and the value of capital over labor. How to make real and significant reforms to how we spend so much on health care and still just barely keep things going…. The Repugs will probably go back to lamenting ‘if only they had nominated a Real Conservative’…

 

[braces_for_impact]

Well, there's fallout from the math...
https://goo.gl/yuOq4e

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Well, there's fallout from the math...
https://goo.gl/yuOq4e

At Trump University, you learn Trump Algebra that indicates:

X - Y = X + 2Y

where X = tax revenue
and Y = tax cuts

 

[Opoponax]

Too early to say. But what I think we'll see a continuing growing desire for universal coverage. And I think the next POTUS candidate that promises it is going to win. But the Dems need a forceful leader that's not afraid to put the GOP on the spot when they try and thwart the effort.

As for Trump, he may very well end up being nothing more than a historical curiosity. America's greatest WTF? Presidential moment. His function will hopefully be to weaken the GOP so much that it ceases to be a major party. Republicans have no excuses right now and the only thing they're doing is destroying. A 4 year old can do that. They can't credibly claim obstruction either. They have the Executive, the Legislative and a 5-4 majority on the Supreme Court. They only have to convince a tiny minority of Democrats and Independents to go along with them on a small handful of things to be able to claim success. But they can't even manage to do that.

And Trump is presiding over all of it.

At least I hope that's what happens. This notion that we could have representatives who looked out for the actual good of the American people seems like a fantasy.

 

[Harry Bosch]

Too early to say. But what I think we'll see a continuing growing desire for universal coverage. And I think the next POTUS candidate that promises it is going to win. But the Dems need a forceful leader that's not afraid to put the GOP on the spot when they try and thwart the effort.

As for Trump, he may very well end up being nothing more than a historical curiosity. America's greatest WTF? Presidential moment. His function will hopefully be to weaken the GOP so much that it ceases to be a major party. Republicans have no excuses right now and the only thing they're doing is destroying. A 4 year old can do that. They can't credibly claim obstruction either. They have the Executive, the Legislative and a 5-4 majority on the Supreme Court. They only have to convince a tiny minority of Democrats and Independents to go along with them on a small handful of things to be able to claim success. But they can't even manage to do that.

And Trump is presiding over all of it.

At least I hope that's what happens. This notion that we could have representatives who looked out for the actual good of the American people seems like a fantasy.

I hate to say it, but universal coverage and other issues beloved by the left are dead. Not sure if you've been watching the recent news, but trump and the republicans are in the process of slashing the existing safety net. They're slashing Medicare, SSN, education, housing, unemployment, and etc. I think that it's reasonable to expect the far left to get many concessions when they help deliver an election. But they either voted third party or didn't vote allowing the republicans full control of the government. There is no substantial opposition now.

 

[ksen]

Actually, support for uhc is growing even among republican voters.

 

[Horatio Parker]

Too early to say. But what I think we'll see a continuing growing desire for universal coverage. And I think the next POTUS candidate that promises it is going to win. But the Dems need a forceful leader that's not afraid to put the GOP on the spot when they try and thwart the effort.

As for Trump, he may very well end up being nothing more than a historical curiosity. America's greatest WTF? Presidential moment. His function will hopefully be to weaken the GOP so much that it ceases to be a major party. Republicans have no excuses right now and the only thing they're doing is destroying. A 4 year old can do that. They can't credibly claim obstruction either. They have the Executive, the Legislative and a 5-4 majority on the Supreme Court. They only have to convince a tiny minority of Democrats and Independents to go along with them on a small handful of things to be able to claim success. But they can't even manage to do that.

And Trump is presiding over all of it.

At least I hope that's what happens. This notion that we could have representatives who looked out for the actual good of the American people seems like a fantasy.

I hate to say it, but universal coverage and other issues beloved by the left are dead. Not sure if you've been watching the recent news, but trump and the republicans are in the process of slashing the existing safety net. They're slashing Medicare, SSN, education, housing, unemployment, and etc. I think that it's reasonable to expect the far left to get many concessions when they help deliver an election. But they either voted third party or didn't vote allowing the republicans full control of the government. There is no substantial opposition now.

Trumps budget is DOA. I see more calls for single payer than ever before. It's not going to go away. It won't happen with this pres or this Congress, but I think the odds of it eventually happening are improving.

 

[Harry Bosch]

I hate to say it, but universal coverage and other issues beloved by the left are dead. Not sure if you've been watching the recent news, but trump and the republicans are in the process of slashing the existing safety net. They're slashing Medicare, SSN, education, housing, unemployment, and etc. I think that it's reasonable to expect the far left to get many concessions when they help deliver an election. But they either voted third party or didn't vote allowing the republicans full control of the government. There is no substantial opposition now.

Trumps budget is DOA. I see more calls for single payer than ever before. It's not going to go away. It won't happen with this pres or this Congress, but I think the odds of it eventually happening are improving.

I hate to be blunt, but the left isn't getting shit unless they can help deliver an election. The republicans have total control of the government. Complete control. Even moderate dems and reps are dog food today.....