The Powell movement

So much for the Powell doctrine. Only a few days ago President Trump deemed Sidney Powell a vital part of his ‘elite strike force’. No longer. Now Rudy Giuliani’s cold statement dismissing Sidney Powell, who has been the attorney for Michael Flynn, from the Trump legal team is arousing much merriment but I don’t share it. If you can’t peddle a good conspiracy theory from within the confines of the Trump camp, then things have come to a pretty pass indeed. All that will be left for Powell is to fold her termination into a larger conspiracy. Dominion, she will likely claim, has dominion over the Trump campaign itself.

Trump himself reportedly has come to view Powell with unease and Tucker Carlson lit into her the other night for her farrago of bogus claims about electoral fraud. She’s gone onto target Georgia governor Brian Kemp as an apostate, leveling the threat of a ‘biblical’ lawsuit at him. Chris Christie deemed it ‘outrageous conduct’. Maybe so. But the plain fact is that the Trump insurgency has reached its Thermidorian phase. The revolution is devouring its children.
Trump may be able to score a small victory tomorrow in Michigan should the state board’s Republicans quiver at the prospect of certifying the vote. They appear to be quivering already.

But as numerous Republicans start to acknowledge Joe Biden’s victory he is flogging a lost cause. At this point some Trump backers are expressing the hope that Biden will pull a Gerald Ford and pardon his predecessor. Fat chance. Biden has said he will leave it up to his attorney general — Sally Yates? — and, in any case, state authorities in New York have Trump in their sights.

It’s obvious why Trump is fighting tooth and nail to reverse his eviction from the White House. He can’t afford to leave. His tenacity is in precise proportion to his legal and financial difficulties. The ouster of Powell will serve as a reminder to his subordinates, past and present, that he thinks only of his own welfare and that everyone else around him is dispensable. Powell, who was probably counting on a pardon for Michael Flynn, may well discover that Trump turns out to be utterly indifferent to his fate. Paul Manafort, too, must be wondering if he’ll actually procure a reprieve.

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But gratitude has never been Trump’s strong suit. Trump embattled is Trump unhinged. He’s just ordered B-52 bombers to the Middle East, promoting speculation that he wants to go mano-a-mano with Iran. If he’s going down, he’ll try to take everyone with him.