Thoughts From A Political Scientist - Updated

Some interesting thoughts from political scientist Jonathan Bernstein, and note that he's just pondering various senarios:

But what if it becomes more and more obvious that Trump should be removed for high crimes and misdemeanors? 

Even though there are good reporters finding no current signs that Republican politicians would turn against Trump (any more than they have already, at least), I wouldn’t count on that necessarily holding up. The Watergate example continues to be relevant. By mid-summer 1973, most of the case against Richard Nixon was already out — and conservative Republicans in Congress were publicly still loyal to him. It took a full year that included the Saturday Night Massacre, more erratic behavior, more revelations and quite a bit more evidence proving what was already known to get conservative Republicans to ultimately agree to support impeachment and removal. 

There’s no way to prove the same thing would happen if there was an overwhelming case against Trump, but it seems likely to me. After the midterm elections, one of the key reasons to stick with him is temporarily gone. If new revelations and evidence hurt him only a little bit, his re-election prospects will start looking dim; if the midterms go badly for Republicans, which is likely, more than a few of them are going to wish that he’d just go away before the 2020 cycle. 

One thing I’m fairly sure of: If Trump is ever removed from office, Republicans will rally around Mike Pence and, within weeks and perhaps days, hardly anyone will be defending Trump. 

Suppose Mueller has the goods on Trump but most Republicans stick with him anyway. The most likely end game then is, again, not particularly ugly: Trump just gets defeated for re-election. That’s the fate of presidents with approval ratings in the low 40s or worse, and there’s no reason to believe he’s an exception. We don’t know whether Trump will remain unpopular in 2020, but if we assume that compelling new evidence is produced, then it’s a lot harder to see him turning things around. 

It’s not at all implausible that, as Blake argues, this all ends badly. There are plenty of nightmare scenarios, including the possibility of a narrow loss in 2020 that Trump tries to overturn in the courts, or even worse. 

Most likely, however, the system sustains damage — perhaps plenty of it — but proves resilient. The same reporting that tells us Republican politicians see no way to actively oppose Trump also tells us that they neither like him very much nor believe he’s fit for the job. That was also the case with Nixon, especially late in the game; it was never the case among Republicans with Reagan and George W. Bush. In the long run, that may prove to be more important than it seems so far. (From Bernstein's column at Bloomberg, read it here.)

Wednesday morning update: An interesting tidbit from Axios. Given how isolated Trump is, and the constant ego-stoking from the sycophants he's surrounded himself with, how surprised will Trump be if, if, Republicans really do start wishing that he'd just go away?

President Trump was unhappy with First Lady Melania after she turned her television on Air Force One to CNN, a network largely regarded as "fake news" by her husband, the New York Times' Katie Rogers and Maggie Haberman report.

Why it matters: This is further indication that Trump is "living in a world of selected information and bending the truth to his own narrative," Rogers and Haberman write.

He demanded that every overseas trip begin with Fox News; officials confirmed to one another internally, via an email obtained by the NYT, and mandated that having the TVs on Air Force One turned to Fox would be "standard operating procedure going forward."

The bottom line: In a time of increased criticism — over his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and now a released recording of a private conversation with his former lawyer Michael Cohen — Trump continues to be "insulated from the outside world," Rogers and Haberman note.

Update #2: Melania's spokeswoman weighs in:

First lady Melania Trump will watch "any channel she wants," according to her spokeswoman in an apparent rebuke to the report President Donald Trump was upset to find her Air Force One television tuned into CNN.

East Wing communications director Stephanie Grisham told CNN Wednesday everyone should be focusing on the issues the first lady is seeking to highlight, such as neonatal abstinence syndrome, rather than what television channel she's watching or a tape of her husband discussing a payout to a woman who claims to have had an extramarital affair with him.

"Did you know that every 15 minutes a baby is born with NAS? Maybe you'd like to talk about the 160,000 kids who skip school every day for fear of being bullied, or that 280,000 students are physically attacked in schools every month," Grisham said. "Seems kind of silly to worry about what channel she watches on TV (any channel she wants btw) or if she heard some recording on the news." (From CNN.com, read the article here.)