It was a stunning display of audacity, to say nothing of the callousness. And it occurred shortly after nineteen school children and their teachers were gunned down in a classroom at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December of 2012.

As the country sat waiting in anticipation of how the NRA would thread the needle between its defense of gun rights and the safety of America’s children, then CEO Wayne LaPierre finally addressed the nation.

But instead of threading the needle, he shoved it into the eyes of the American public, by saying, “The best defense against a bad guy with a gun, is a good guy with a gun.” And that was it. That was the crux of the NRA’s defiant response.

And it worked.

It killed any momentum the anti-gun lobby had gained in congress and throughout the country as a result of the tragedy. Which meant that the only tangible result of the whole stunning episode, was the predictable increase in gun sales, especially of assault weapons like the one the shooter used in his killing spree. And that allowed LaPierre’s aphorism to become perhaps the most often heard refrain in the gun control debate in the country.

Or at least it was until Uvalde, and the pitiful nature of the “good guys’” response, especially as detailed in the DOJ report which came out last Thursday.

The main focus of that report is of course the dysfunction and incompetence of the police at the scene. And there was plenty of it to document – systemic dysfunction, bureaucratic dysfunction, and personal incompetence, along with a whole lot of cowardice and stupidity as well, especially in the aftermath. But at the heart of that report, buried deep within its troubling detail, was a much broader message – and one which no one seems to want to address.

And that deeper message is the plain, common sense fact, that it would have been suicidal for the initially responding police officers, armed with nothing more than their standard issue vests and service pistols, to confront a man with an AR-15 assault rifle who was hiding in a closet waiting to ambush them inside a room full of school children.

Of course we all know by now, that in an active shooter situation that is their job. It is the job of police to confront the shooter as soon as they enter the building. And as the DOJ report makes clear, they are not to wait for backup or additional equipment.

But to my knowledge, no one has offered a demonstration of how that confrontation could be successful in a situation like the one the officers faced that day, without the kind of training, body armor, shields and other equipment which are in general use by SWAT teams around the country – such as those from the US Border Patrol, who did eventually enter the room and kill the shooter.

Which means that for LaPierre’s platitude to be of any value, every police officer in the state would need to be trained and equipped like those SWAT team members.

And Texas Governor Greg Abbott knows this. Which may be why he and his Attourney General have failed to prosecute a single one of the hundreds of police officers who were on the scene that day, and why they seem to be doing everything they can to delay, if not prevent, any potential indictments. Because they know what the defense of those officers would be.

In one form or another, the initially responding officers will testify that, given their training and equipment, it would have been suicidal for them to enter that room and confront the shooter, and that it likely would have resulted in the deaths of more children.

And as a result, during any prosecution, the public discussion would likely center around what the state would have needed to do in the months and years leading up to the incident, in order for LaPierre’s “good guy” fantasy to become a reality. And that discussion would probably conclude that SWAT training and equipment would need to have been provided for every police officer at every level, in every county and city and town in the entire state of Texas.

And given that studies have shown that police officers generally arrive at mass murders too late to be of much consequence, that type of training and equipment would also need to be provided for teachers in every school in the state.

And besides making teachers the first target of every school shooter, that kind of effort would bankrupt the State of Texas, just as surely as LaPierre’s corruption has bankrupted the NRA.

Which among other things means there is no way Abbott and his administration can justify the insane lack of firearms regulations in the state. And there is no way they can even suggest to Texans, that given its gun laws, the state has done what it needs to do to limit, in any way whatsoever, the possibility of an incident like Uvalde from happening next year, or next week, or next hour.

And that reality might lead to an investigation of the Abbott administrations legal liabilities as a result. It might also force the country to ask, “How could those laws be consistent with a common sense reading of the US constitution, or with the kind of rational thinking that is supposed to accompany by such matters?”

Because the reality is that arguments coming from that perspective seldom are. Just as that kind of inconsistency is also present when we hear conservatives like Abbott rail against the way historical figures are treated by the “woke mob.” According to those who share that view, important figures of the past should not be judged by 21^st century cultural standards. And there is certain wisdom in that. But by that same reasoning, why should we now be forced to live by 18^th century technological standards, such as those in the US Constitution which regulate firearms.

Yet those are the standards Americans now live by when it comes to the kinds of firearms available today, the lethality of which the country’s founders could hardly have imagined. And that is certainly true of assault weapons, like the ones used in Sandy Hook and Uvalde – and the vast majoity of other mass murders. Which illustrates another of the specious, yet often-quoted assertions by the NRA.

That one goes something like this, “There is no difference between assault rifles and semi-automatic hunting rifles of the same calibre. And the only reason you liberals don’t like them, is because they look more dangerous.”

Either that, or they simply claim there’s “no such thing” as assault weapons (as a separate class of firearms). In other words, they’re basically saying it’s a distinction without a difference. Which, simliar to LaPierre’s “good guy” assertion, has carried the day for several decades. But the assault weapons claim is just as ludicrous.

Because those “cosmetic” distinctions do make assault rifles quite different, and in ways that make them much more lethal instruments of death – as any red-blooded mass murderer will tell you. Which is why they all prefer to use them in their killing.

The first supposedly cosmetic difference, as can be seen in the image below, is the metal structure around the rifle barrel. That’s called a barrel shroud. And it’s there to keep the operator from burning himself. Because if you fire a rifle at a rate of several rounds per second, which assault rifles are capable of doing, that barrel is going to get very hot very quickly. And the main reason that is not a concern with hunting rifles, is that no self-respecting hunter is going to fire that many rounds that quickly.

­­­­The second and perhaps most obvious “cosmetic” difference, is the assault rifle’s pistol grip – which allows the operator to “aim” more quickly and shoot from a more effective stance – such as from the hip. All of which gives him more efficient ways to kill massive amounts of people at short range. By contrast, a shoulder-fired rifle offers a narrower kill zone, and the shooter is much more vulnerable to being attacked from behind or from the side – mainly because he has a much narrower range of vison and focus. So in relatively close quarters, it’s simply much safer and easier for an unarmed bystander to tackle someone shooting a shoulder-fired rifle. And mass murderers know this. That is why the vast majority of them choose assault rifles to do their killing.

Of course a pistol can be used in much the same way. But a hand gun has a smaller bullet, which fires at a much lower velocity. And as a result, it does much less damage to the victim.

So to sum up, mass murderers use assault rifles to do their killing, so they can safely fire more rounds more quickly, and spray bullets over a wider area using a much deadlier round – all while being less vulnerable to attack of any kind. It’s that simple. And it’s all based on the fact that assault rifles are built with one purpose in mind. And it’s not to hunt rabbits and deer. They are designed and manufactured to kill lots of people very quickly, and with little skill or effort required by the shooter.

And I find it hard to believe that anyone who has studied the matter closely does not understand this. So I suspect it is either cowardice or willful ignorance, which is causing lawmakers like Abbott to fail to appreciate the specious nature of the NRA’s “arguments.” It is cowardice to know the kind of damage assault weapons can do, especially to children – yet refuse to ban them or to even speak out about them, because of fear of political retaliation. And it’s willful ignorance for those, like Governor Abbott, to seek to make them more readily available to their citizens, in an effort to please gun manufacturers and the morally, and now financially bankrupt NRA.

Which to me means the level of cowardice of Abbott and politicians like him, pales in comparison to that of any of the police officers who stood trembling outside that Uvalde classroom.

It also speaks to an understanding by Governor Abbott of his potential legal liabilities, thanks to his failure to provide an effective law enforcement response to the incident in Uvalde. And in light of Abbott’s populist demeanor and the understandable public outrage, his administration’s failure to prosecute any of the police officers who responded that day seems an attempt to hide that failure.

Or is he simply stating that no one was at fault in Uvalde, because in a state with such insanely lax gun laws, nothing rational can be done that would in any meanigful way, even begin to protect the state’s most vulnerable citizens – its children?

And the most depressing aspect of the whole sorry episode, is that it might make Uvalde the go-to model for prospective mass murderers in the days and years to come.

It is hard to overstate the importance of belief systems. They are a vital part of what makes us human. Because they give us something to… well, believe in. And that can help make our lives worthwhile, by giving us more to live for. But in the process they can also make us stagnant and less imaginative – if not just plain dumb.

Look how stubbornly blind we remained for centuries, because of our unwillingness to question anything that appeared in the bible. How long were we not able to see the curve of the earth’s surface, even from the perspective of a mountain top? And how long did we look up at the moon as it passed through its many phases – the ones created by its own shadow – apparently without having the foggiest notion that it was a ball and not a disk, or for that matter, that the planet we watched it from was one as well – and that it was not the center of the universe, or even of our solar system.

That ignorance was a testament to the power of our belief system, the one that told us everything in the bible was literally true, and that everything we had “learned” from the church and its priesthood, had to continue to be true as well – lest we inadvertently challenge anything the bible might be telling us.

Thankfully we are much too well informed and educated to be so receptive today. We’re able to think for ourselves – at least we like to think so.

That is why so many of us look at the MAGA crowd, and ask ourselves, how could they be so stupid as to so blindly follow someone like Trump? How can they not realize how wrong he is about the election, about everything? And how did we get to the point where someone like him could get elected village idiot, never mind President of the United States?

The answers to those questions mainly come down to an unwillingness by his followers to consider any facts that challenge their Trump-centric view of the world. And perhaps the reason we have no answers to our questions about them, is because of a similar obstinance by those of us outside that camp, and in progressive politics in general.

So to the above questions I would add, what does progressive politics have to do with our inability to see across the divide that sits between ourselves and those who worship Donald Trump?

To search for that answer, I’d like to step back a moment and take a look at an important issue that’s been around for decades, but is still highly relevant today – as can be seen in my book, The Contrarian Candidate. So let’s consider the continuing debate around an assault weapons ban.

To my way of thinking, the reason a full ban is not already in place is largely due to the argument the NRA has cleverly presented. And it goes something like this, “Assault rifles are no more dangerous than semi-automatic hunting rifles of the same caliber. In fact the differences are purely cosmetic. And the only reason you liberals don’t like them is because they look more dangerous.”

Either that, or they simply claim that assault weapons “do not exist” as a class of firearms.

In other words, they’re basically saying it’s a distinction without a difference. And that might make sense – except for the fact that it’s pure nonsense. Because those “cosmetic” distinctions do make assault rifles quite different, and in ways that make them much more lethal instruments of death – as any red-blooded mass murderer will tell you. Which is why they all prefer to use them in their killing.

The first supposedly cosmetic difference, as can be seen in the image below, is the metal structure around the rifle barrel. That’s called a barrel shroud. And it’s there to keep the operator from burning himself. Because if you fire a rifle at a rate of several rounds per second, which assault rifles are capable of doing, that barrel is going to get very hot very quickly. And the reason that is not a concern with hunting rifles, is because no self-respecting hunter is going to fire that many rounds that quickly.­­­­

The second and perhaps most obvious “cosmetic” difference, is the assault rifle’s pistol grip – which allows the operator to “aim” more quickly and shoot from a more effective stance – such as from the hip. All of which gives him more efficient ways to kill massive amounts of people at short range. By contrast, a shoulder-fired rifle offers a narrower kill zone, and the shooter is much more vulnerable to being attacked from behind or from the side – mainly because he has a much narrower range of vision. So in relatively close quarters, it’s simply much safer and easier for an unarmed bystander to tackle someone shooting a shoulder-fired rifle. And mass murderers know this. That is why the vast majority of them choose assault rifles to do their killing.

Of course a pistol can be used in much the same way. But a hand gun has a smaller bullet, which fires at a much lower velocity. And as a result, it does much less damage to the victim.

So to sum up, mass murderers use assault rifles to do their killing, so they can safely fire more rounds more quickly, and spray bullets over a wider area using a much deadlier round – all while being less vulnerable to attack of any kind. It’s that simple. And it’s all based on the fact that assault rifles are built with one purpose in mind. And it’s not to hunt rabbits and deer. They are designed and manufactured to kill lots of people very quickly, and with little skill or effort required by the shooter.

Yet in all the years the NRA has been perpetuating the myth about the cosmetic nature of assault rifles, the progressive antigun lobby has been unable to employ, or perhaps even understand, this simple, precise and rather obvious rebuttal. And why is that?

To my mind it speaks mainly to an inability by those who lead the progressive movement to think outside the box. Which in this instance would mean seeing the world from a different perspective, one not dominated by progressive ideals, but rather from the perspective of those outside their liberalist point of view. And that inability stems mainly from the fact that the progressive “priesthood” inside its bi-coastal, ivy league bubble, tends to look at anything beyond its pristine view of reality, as either dirty, sinful, unattractive, or just plain beneath its supposedly lofty status – and therefore not worthy of its attention.

So issues about guns and hunting or anything considered part of “Trump country,” is not to be discussed at all, except when served with huge helpings of distain. Thus they fail to see the real difference between assault rifles and hunting rifles – and that it has nothing to do with cosmetics.

This constriction of the senses is also the result of a decades-long narrowing of liberal ideology, essentially down to an almost singular perspective, that of feminism. Just consider the issues that are part of today’s progressive agenda, in comparison with those of feminism:

– Reproductive rights, check

– Sexual assault and harassment, check

– Equal pay and opportunity for women, check

– Affirmative action, check.

Of course you could also include climate change and a few other issues not related to any specific social group – but not much else.

Some may argue that such matters as equal opportunity extend beyond women to the LGBT+ community. But how about trans women? Why aren’t they worthy of the same protections and opportunities? And what about a concern for children? Isn’t that part of feminist ideology? Sure, as long as those concerns are not specific to boys. And similarly, racial equality is a concern only when those concerns are not specific to men of color.

And that gets us back to the overriding issue at hand, the success of Donald Trump. Clearly his base is made up mostly of men, mainly white men, but increasingly those of color as well, especially Hispanic. And why is that? Why have men left the Democratic Party in such numbers to vote for Trump? Why would they even consider doing that?

Well maybe it’s because the Democrats and progressives in general have left men totally out of the political debate. If you don’t believe that, then make a list of all the men’s issues that are an essential part of today’s politics. Can you name even one that is up there in perceived importance with those listed earlier for women?

Did your list include a concern about the fact that men are victims of 80% of all deaths of despair, like drug overdose and suicide? Likely not. Because even if you knew about those issues, you know they’ve never been a part of the debate – and similarly, neither has the much shorter life expectancy of men, or their shockingly high rates of homelessness, incarceration and addiction.

I’m not here to advocate for men’s issues. That’s for others to do if they wish. I’m only trying to point out the ways Trump won the presidency, and the role progressive politics may have played in that – and may now be playing in his current success. I’m here to say that a political party dominated by a single narrow ideology, especially one a half century old, is not likely to have much connection with the real issues of the day – if only because its adherents are not able to see the world as it now is, but only as its outdated ideology needs it to be in order to survive. So if it needs the world to be flat, then the world will be flat. If it needs its ideology to be the center of the universe, then it will be the center of the universe. And that is not a recipe for success in the real world.

And it’s not that these feminist issues are unimportant. They clearly do deserve attention, even today. But my questions are these, “Do they really represent the totality of the social problems currently being faced by the country? And are they really the only issues Democratic politics needs to address?”

Because a political party, like any institution, has only so much funding, time and reach – and therefore only so much it can do. And with the primary focus within the Democratic Party being on feminist issues, there’s little time or appetite for any others. And that gives Donald Trump free reign to go after men – and their dutiful partners (as Hilary Clinton once framed it).

And it isn’t as if Trump himself is campaigning on behalf of men and their issues. It’s only that he’s willing to blow up the world, especially the parts of it men have come to resent, mainly as a result of being repeatedly ignored, ostracized, and even ridiculed by them – like Hollywood, the mainstream media, higher education, and the political system as a whole. Which leaves a real opening for anyone with a positive message.

So even if you don’t think male issues are deserving of attention, isn’t it worth spending a bit of time and effort on them if it helps defeat Donald Trump, especially given how much his success with men is a result of them being ignored, if not rejected by the Democratic Party?

Just look at the Hilary Clinton campaign of 2016. When she was criticized for not being able to attract more male voters, she of course attributed that to misogyny and a backlash against feminism, rather than her failure to advocate for a single male issue during her entire campaign. But after the Democratic convention she reluctantly agreed to spend a few hours on male issues.

So what was her message to men during that brief period?

It was essentially that, women’s issues are men’s issues. And that was as far as she was willing to go in her effort to appeal to men.

So I invite all the women reading this to reverse that statement and see how it sits with them. Because that is how a lot of men feel about every issue, every debate, every election that takes place in politics today. They feel the same as you would feel about voting for someone who has only one thing to say to you – that “men’s issues are women’s issues.”

Though admittedly, with Trump still around, and with him having such a high probability of winning, that message may turn out to be a whole lot more prescient than most would care to imagine. Because with most women so concerned about defeating Donald Trump – men’s issues may truly turn out to be women’s issues in the presidential election of 2024.

And no, that’s not Trumpist denialism. I’m just saying that Biden didn’t win. Trump lost. He lost because of COVID. He lost because of his idiotic reaction to the pandemic and what that did to the country and its economy. Hell he might have even lost because the preponderance of those who died were his supporters, both because of their age and their views on COVID. As one grieving daughter famously put it, “My father’s only precondition was that he was a Trump supporter.”

And then there was how the pandemic affected the campaign, allowing Biden to hide in his basement, far from voters, and out of sight of the media and its prying eyes.

Hell, Joe Biden didn’t even win the Democratic primary. Instead he had it handed to him by Jim Clyburn of South Carolina. That’s why in his victory speech the night of that primary Biden looked as shocked as anyone to find himself standing there. Because in the previous three contests he’d run no better than a weak 2nd and as low as 5th – as the party’s former vice-president no less.

But this time he’s actually going to have to face the cameras and the voters, not to mention a long, stressful, arduous campaign – which he is clearly not up to.

So I’m not sure if the Democrats are in shock or denial or fantasy land. But any way you look at it they have a problem.

Because they are faced with a choice. Do they stick with the guy who’s likely to lose, or do the party leaders get their collective act together and do what Clyburn did in 2020, and use their clout to bail the party out of a difficult situation? And remember, during that campaign Biden was billed (and in some ways ran) as a White House caretaker – just there to defeat Trump and keep the seat warm for the next in line. But with his VP even lower in the polls than he is, the party is going to have to look elsewhere. And they have a big enough bench, that they should be able to find someone who can carry the flag and still garner enough independent votes to win it in November.

But making that choice will take real courage and fortitude and persistence and imagination and… well, a whole lot of attributes the Democratic establishment does not seem to posses. Yet that appears to be their only hope of keeping the White House and defeating Donald Trump.

The polls in the battleground states show Biden to be losing to Trump by at least 5 points in five of those six key states. The Democrats keep saying “it’s early.” But for those words to mean anything they have to show what could change, and more importantly, how they’re going to change it.

Short of that, what do they think is going to happen between now and next November? Biden is not going to get any younger. Nor is he likely to get any more popular. Because it’s not like he’s an unknown commodity which the public has to get to know. They already know him all too well. That’s the problem. In politics, perhaps even more than elsewhere in life, opinions don’t change. They only harden.

And Biden wears all this unpopularity even while presiding over an economy that’s in fairly decent shape, certainly compared to the rest of the planet. So they can’t hope for any real improvement on that front. If anything, the reverse is likely to happen. Because with the economies of most other countries struggling, combined with all the hotspots and other problems roiling the world, a downturn is a much more likely prospect.

Either way, it seems pretty clear that Biden is going to have to win it in 2024. Because Trump is not likely to lose it the way he did in 2020 – if only because he and his team are sure to have learned plenty from that experience – as any loser does, whether in sports or business or politics. And that defeat is informing every decision they’re making, as they learn how to deal with the strengths and weaknesses of their candidate.

Not so the Democrats, whose candidate is not yet in campaign mode. Which means Biden’s inabilities will not become truly evident until he’s personally challenged. And without a primary race, that won’t happen until the presidential debates in the fall of 2024, when it will be far too late to make a change.

And how can anyone think Biden is going to defeat Trump in the debates. Because Trump is certain not to try the same strategy as last time – that whole debate filibuster routine. This time he’s going to do his very best to shut the hell up and let Biden sink himself with his words and lack of energy and focus.

And this meme that Biden has always been a bit of a clutz with his words, but that somehow it doesn’t matter because he’s a policy guy – is not going to wash with the voters – or the media. Because it’s really not an answer. Rather, it’s an indication of another of his problems.

One of the reasons Trump can come across as so much more vigorous mentally, is because there’s nothing to clog up his brain. He’s just shooting from the hip. No complex policies or their details (or really much of anything) to get in the way.

But to be effective as a “policy guy,” Biden has to focus in a way that allows him to recall the facts and figures and timelines and contingencies of policies and issues and statutes – and get them straight. And he’s obviously not capable of doing that on anywhere near a consistent basis. So you can expect slip-ups to happen daily, if not hourly, as the campaign gets into gear. And unlike most other stale incumbents, a rigorous campaign is not going to sharpen his skills. It’s only going to dull them with fatigue.

And then after month upon month of gruelling campaigning, and Biden feeling pummelled and totally drained, he’s going to have to get up on that debate stage. And the side by side comparisons are going to be stark, to say the least. Remember that stunned look when Kamala Harris attacked him in the first Democratic primary debate. Well expect more of the same. Because you can be sure Trump’s people are going to be coming up with prosecutorial ambushes of their own, which are going to leave Biden standing there stunned, confused and muttering to himself.

Contrast that with what we’re seeing from Trump on the stump, and in his interviews. Just look at the way he’s able to thrust and parry and deflect when defending his idiotic and indefensible positions – as he did with Kristen Welker on NBC. He often displays a kind of mental gymnastics, not to mention fortitude, that Biden and the Democrats can only dream of. Which means trouble for Biden on the debate stage.

Meanwhile the Democrats keep bringing up the abortion issue as their one get out of jail free card. And sure it’s a winner for them. But there’s no way Trump and his campaign are going to allow themselves to get sucked into that debate this time around. They’re sure to have learned from the last couple of elections. And they have a head start in that direction, thanks to the fact that from the beginning Trump has been highly sceptical of making it an issue – one of those surprising indications of his unfathomable talent as a politician. From the moment of the Dobbs decision, he has been wary of abortion as an issue. So if the Democrats are dreaming of winning the election with it, they can forget it.

It only worked this year because the Republican candidates were forced to swing to the right on abortion in the primaries. But Trump doesn’t have to do that. All he needs to say to his base is that he’s the one who defeated Roe by packing the Supreme Court. From then on, he can dodge the issue by saying what every other sane Republican candidate is saying, that he doesn’t want a federal ban. Let the states decide it etc. etc. That takes it out of his hands in a way in which nothing else needs to be said.

Besides no one in his base is voting for Trump on the issues. They’re voting for him out of a desire to prove they were right in voting for him in the past – and to “prove” that he really did win in 2020. So for them, it’s all about vindication.

All of which means that Trump is not going to just go away. And if the Democrats still believe that his legal troubles are going to sink him, then we have to ask ourselves what they’re using to spike their morning lattes. Because those legal “troubles” only seem to be making him stronger.

Of course Trump is always going to be Trump. But who can say that doesn’t work for him. In fact that seems to be his strongest asset.

To be sure, the Democrats are always going to point to the fact that he’s locked in the past, constantly relitigating his 2020 defeat. But as I suggested earlier, the Democrats seem to be doing the same, by continuing to believe that Biden actually beat him. In fact that seems to be their only clearly-stated reason for sticking with him now. But my guess is that Trump denialism is going to prove far less problematic and a lot less fatal than Biden triumphalism. Because that triumphalism is causing the Democrats to continue to act in a way that is counter to the facts on the ground and the reality of their candidate.

Even the slickly prepared ads they rolled out in September couldn’t make Biden appear energetic, or even capable. In fact they had the opposite effect. They only proved that there’s nothing they can do to make him look like a winner. Which in turn only gave further evidence of how foggy-headed and doddering the man truly is. Just think about all the footage they had to work with, not just of him during his European trip, but elsewhere over the last several years. Yet out of all that material, they couldn’t come up with 30 seconds of footage that made him look as though he was remotely on top of his game.

So if slick advertising can’t fix the Democrats’ so-called messaging problem, what will? What is their plan going forward to change the narrative and the course of the election? They seem to have no idea.

Well I have one. Get your act together and pull a Clyburn. Select someone out of the potential pool of contenders. And if you choose the kind of person Biden should have picked as his VP – perhaps even using the same sort of process – then the potential of that candidate should be enough to convince Biden not to run again. And you need to do that before it really becomes too late. Because in my view, and I believe in the view of anyone who’s looking at this rationally, Joe Biden has very little chance, if any, of winning in 2024.

Did you guess the names of the litigants from the title of this piece? I bet you did. For better or worse, they’re the ones who’ve been on our minds for months now.

And to be honest, Jack Smith versus Donald Trump doesn’t seem a fair fight. On the one hand, we have special attorney Smith: a tightly-focussed, highly-motivated, extremely-competent litigator, who seems determined to squeeze every ounce of justice out of the crimes Trump allegedly committed. The man is a killer prosecutor plain and simple.

On the other hand, we have Donald Trump: figuratively a thick-skulled, fat little piggy, squealing his way into and around the many legal traps spread across prosecutor Jack Smith’s vast and treacherous terrain.

But things are very different in the political realm and the court of public opinion. Unlike so many of his fellow attorneys, Smith seems reluctant to venture into that territory. So it’s not a place where he seems likely to shine. Witness the public appearances he’s made so far. It’s hard to say what it is, but when he’s in front of a live camera he just doesn’t look like the killer-prosecutor his press photos and reputation have established him to be. And that could mean trouble.

Because no matter what happens in the courts of law, the voting public is going to be the ultimate judge and jury. Anyone who thinks otherwise is dreaming. And as we get closer to the election, things are going to get really messy – to make an obvious point – in part because that’s where Trump will ultimately shine.

But what may not seem so obvious, are Trump’s strengths in the legal realm – all stemming from the fact that the man is a full blown narcissist. It may seem crazy to say this. But that so-called “liability” may have its legal advantages for someone like Trump.

Take for example those public rants of his, the ones that are so often ridiculed in the press. And what about the fact that he just can’t seem to stop making them, no matter the consequences of his rantings about himself and his issues.

To this point, most of the analysis seems to be focussing on the degree to which Trump is destroying his potential legal defences with what he’s saying. But to me those remarks bolster his real defence: the fact that he is such a sick and dysfunctional human being.

According to the bulk of the analysis, the most incriminating aspect of Trump’s comments is that his own statements prove he knew he lost the election. In fact that seems to be the primary indictment of those actions, as well as perhaps the key pivot point in the prosecutor’s case. But again, to me those statements and the fact that he’s willing to make them so publicly, only further demonstrates his narcissism and resultant dysfunction.

So I suppose the ultimate question has to be, which is it? Is he really that dumb or really that sick? Or is he really in fact some kind of netherworld genius fooling us all with his narcissistic brilliance?

I seriously doubt the evil genius thing, as my book The Contrarian Candidate tends to indicate. To me the truth is that he just can’t seem to get it through his head that other people don’t love him the way he loves himself – and certainly not the way he expects them to. And why would we be surprised by that?

After all, we’re talking about a man who, before he got to be really big, was known to call local entertainment reporters in New York pretending to be a man who was good buddies with Donald Trump (and thinking he could get away with that). And he did that solely to tell those reporters what a great guy Trump was, and what a stud he was with the ladies. Think about that for a moment. We’re talking here about someone who is sincerely and sickly in love with himself, everything about himself – to the point where he can’t even seem to imagine that others would not see him and the world exactly as he does.

So could someone like that ever really come to terms with, and allow himself to truly accept something as publicly humiliating as the loss of the 2020 presidential election? Because we’re talking about perhaps the most humbling defeat anyone has ever suffered – the loss of what was likely the most publicized election in history.

There is some reason to believe he is truly not able to digest that fact. And regardless, there is plenty of reason to believe that his supporters on a “jury of his peers” would be unable to believe he lost the election – if only because they don’t believe it themselves. Which means that knowing for certain that Donald Trump has the ability to truly believe he lost the election, is likely beyond a reasonable doubt – at least in the minds of potential jurors. And you know what that means.

What it certainly means is that anyone looking for a quick and easy way out of the Trump era, via a sudden and resounding conviction in the courts of law, had better think again. It’s not going to be that easy. It never is. Trump is going to have to be convicted in the court of public opinion. And that starts with an election defeat.

Admittedly, that defeat is likely to be unconvincing to most of his supporters. But at least it would (hopefully) keep him out of the Whitehouse, and to some extent off the minds of the country – at least for a while. And then perhaps there will come a time when he can be properly prosecuted in a court of law. But either way, at this point Trump’s legal worries don’t seem to be bothering him politically, quite the opposite.

In fact many pundits and some opponents believe the Mar-A-Logo raid to be the turning point in this season’s election. Because before that happened Trump seemed to be on the down side of his political career. Even some of those notoriously “timid” house and senate Republicans seemed to be leaning towards admitting they were over him. But that ended the instant the Mar-A-Logo “raid” hit. And those public political murmurings have not since returned. But an election defeat would almost certainly start them up again, and in a way that no conviction in a court of law likely could.

Either way, if you strike the king you’d better kill him. And for the time being Trump is king of the court of public opinion – and a powerful king at that. So a trial is highly-unlikely to strike a fatal blow.

And it isn’t just his solid position among Republicans, or his ever-apparent narcissism, that make a definitive conviction unlikely. Because on Trump’s side is also the fact that there are legitimate concerns about the way his prosecution has been pursued. And that includes the fact that two state attorney’s general ran their most recent election campaigns on a promise of prosecuting him. And I ask you, could that look any more political?

Actually it turns out it could, given the fact that Georgia AG Fani Willis has since brought indictments on the same crimes Trump has already been indicted for federally. And she is doing it on the rather suspect pretext that a Georgia conviction is less likely to be rendered moot by him personally. Aside from all the lawyerly opinions as to the utility of that move, does she really believe that if elected president, Trump would stop at such a technicality? And what would that do to the country?

And then of course there is the speed with which those prosecutions are being pursued, set against the year and a half AG Merit Garland delayed in appointing a special council to investigate Trump. If it’s such an obvious and urgent matter, then why wait so long? And look at all the ways Trump’s prosecution has differed from those of other RICO-type crimes.

Those prosecutions generally start from the bottom, and squeeze their way up to the top – like a tube of tooth paste. Because the more you squeeze those on the bottom, the more comes out with which to squeeze those nearer the top – until you get to the very top.

You don’t start at the top and work your way down. Which is what Smith appears to be doing by indicting Trump before any of his Whitehouse staff or other co-conspirators. Why is that? Even legal experts who support that move agree it is being done to speed up the trial. So what’s the sudden rush?

Even a baby raised by wolves can figure that one out. And so can Trump supporters.

The only thing that can explain the current prosecution and its methodology, is politics. And his supporters have every right to raise it as an issue. And what does that do – other than elicit more feelings of contempt for the institutions of state.

And to make matters worse, this all seems to have slipped the watchful eyes of the media, focussed as they are on seeing Trump come to justice. Which to Trump supporters is further proof that the world is out to get their incorruptible hero. And all of that is just one more way of saying hello to at least four more years of Donald Trump – whether inside or outside the Whitehouse.

I agree with Matt Lewis of the Daily Beast when he credits Chris Christie with having the best take on the current political moment – simply because he realizes it’s a decision between “Trump or not Trump,” and is acting on that assumption.

But Christie also has the one talent anyone who wants to beat Trump must have – an innate, Rickles-like ability to use one-liners to shoot him down. That factor has always seemed obvious to me. In fact it’s only because of politicians like the hapless (and oblivious) Marco Rubio that that strategy came to seem unworkable. But then again, Rubio’s haplessness has become legendary, in part because it also helped give Christie his one shining moment of 2016, when it allowed him to single-handedly blast Rubio onto the trash heap of presidential history.

In some ways, that incident also helps illustrate the other reason Lewis cites for giving Christie a big fat leg up. He’s entertaining. Which means Christie has more going for him than any candidate other than Trump. So why is he lagging in the polls? And why is he ultimately likely to fail to win the nomination?

Because he doesn’t know how to truly connect with Trump voters.

Sure, he knows how to sling the one-liners, and in a way that anyone not named Donald Trump can appreciate. But in order for him to be successful, he will need to bring Trump country Republicans over to him. And he just doesn’t seem to have the touch for that.

So who does?

Regrettably, no one to this point – at least not in the real world. And the only way to appreciate what I mean by that, is to listen to Charlie Wyatt, the former stand up comic in my novel The Contrarian Candidate. And I’m being serious here. Because it’s impossible to understand what’s truly missing, even from an otherwise talented politician like Chis Christie, unless you listen to someone who has what it takes – however fictional he may be.

And along with a political comedian’s acerbic wit, Wyatt has the ability to connect with Trump’s voters in a way that only someone who grew up in Trump country can. And sure, there are plenty of politicians who say that’s where they’re from. But few of them really seem to know how to connect with the people we’re talking about here. And as David Books of the New York Times and others have pointed out, that’s because today’s politicians seem to have grown up on the other side of the tracks from those folks, and then, as their lives (and careers outside politics) progressed, did whatever they could to drift further from them. And as a result, they just don’t seem to know those folks; know how they think, know how they talk, know how they feel.

That takes someone like Wyatt, someone who can talk to them about anything from assault rifles to sexual abuse, with the kind of barroom banter they appreciate and understand – all the while empathizing, even sympathising, with their understanding of the world. And that allows Wyatt to show that he’s one of them and knows where they’re coming from – in part because he really comes from there too.

Christie will never have that kind of backhome touch. Which is why Trump voters will never really warm to him, the way they might to someone like Wyatt. Christie is too smart-mouthed-New Yorker for them, too sharp and edgy. Plus he’s too well educated and willing to show it – unlike Trump who (despite his own assessment) seems too dumb to know anything about anything truly worth knowing.

All of which lines up very nicely with a line of attack Christie’s very adept at using – a line of attack which is particularly effective against someone like Trump – showing what an ignorant, incompetent, loser Trump really is.

But most Trump supporters think he’s smart – at least in a foggy and confused, what-did-he-just-say kind of way. And unfortunately Christie doesn’t know how to campaign outside his attack mode in a way that allows him to appeal to voters who think and feel that way about Trump.

Plus they will always see Christie as a politician, since that’s how they first met him – and as a politician they didn’t particularly like. In fact he’s one of the most disliked Republicans (at least among Republicans). Democrats and Independents like him better. But that’s not exactly a winning profile for someone who’s seeking the Republican nomination.

No doubt Christie’s presence will weaken Trump to some extent. But who’s he going to weaken Trump for – to who’s benefit?

That’s complicated by the fact that this race isn’t about the usual left/right dynamic. It’s about the more historical “haves versus have-nots,” and the dividing line between the classes – or in its modern context, those riding-high-on-the-global-economy, versus those getting-left-behind-by-it-all. And that definitely leaves Christie out. Because there’s nothing “getting left behind” about that guy, except maybe the trailing wobble of his butt.

So how has a rich New Yorker like Trump gotten away with it. He’s done it by convincing his supporters the world is out to get him – an idea that comes naturally to him, thanks to having been rejected by New York’s elite for so long. But again, New Jersey’s former top prosecutor and governor is never going to pass the smell test as a left-behinder. So he can forget about it.

And so can Tim Scott and Doug Burgum and Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy and anyone else who takes so much as a desirous glance at the rags to riches card. Because for the most part, Trump voters aren’t interested. To them it’s about the fact that you’ve made it and they haven’t. And that’s probably as a result of something you’ve done to people like them.

And who does that leave as the likely nominee? You guessed it.

So could someone please point me to the real Charlie Wyatt? Because that’s who it’s going to take to save us all from four more years of Donald Trump.

I know it’s a meme going around these days. And it’s definitely Vivek Ramaswamy’s game plan. But this is getting ridiculous.

As I watched Ramaswamy’s performance in the first Republican Presidential Debate, it occurred to me that not a word comes out of the man’s mouth that is not in line with, and in direct service to Ramaswamy’s clear and obvious goal – that of trying to out Trump Trump. His entire campaign, his entire political career, seems to be centered around appealing to the Trump base. And that’s about it.

He seems to have no strategy or ambition beyond that – other than maybe being Trump’s VP nominee. And he can forget about that. Not that Trump wouldn’t love it – a like-minded Mini Me to hang around with, especially one so eager to suck up to him. But even Trump (or at least someone close to him) surely has to know what a disastrous ticket that would be.

After all, the reason Trump picked Mike Pense the first time around, was not because he liked the man, or that the two were skympatico in any way. In fact, it was because Pense was so dissimilar, mainly in the area of political experience, in that Pense had some – and as a member of the US congress no less.

So Trump needed him and he knew it (or at least his advisors did). Not so Ramaswamy. The guy has literally nothing to offer, other than fealty to Trump. Again, not saying that doesn’t appeal to Trump. Because clearly it does. But if there’s one thing Trump’s candidacy does not need, it’s more of the same, including one more narcissist to gum up the works – especially one who’s only real talent appears to be an ability to kiss the collective asses of Trump’s voters.

And the rest of the candidates should take note.

It’s pretty clear that the world (at least the part of it outside Trump’s vacuous brain cavity) clearly knows it does not need more Trump. Even most Republicans know this, including may of Trump’s base supporters. But that is not what they’re getting – even from the non-Trump candidates in the “race.” And that just goes to show what a weak, ineffective and uninspired lot those candidates are. Because throughout the course of this entire election cycle, not a single one of them has come up with a new policy or idea that has gained any real traction – either within the Trump base or without.

And that includes the current number two DeSantis. Everything the man has said which is not a direct mimicry of Trump, has failed – and not just among Trump supporters. The most famous of these gaffs posing as ideas, is his six week ban on Florida abortions. That has gotten him nowhere with anyone (other than perhaps a few in the evangelical community).

And why would it work with the rest of the base? After all, Trump supporters have unwanted pregnancies too. And even they know that a pregnancy could go undetected for six weeks, or close enough to that cut-off date, that it would be extremely difficult to see the doctors, make the arrangements, and wrestle with the often difficult decision of going ahead with an abortion, before that time was up.

Yet that abortion ban is one of the few “ideas” to emerge from the DeSantis campaign that was not reminiscent of the Trump playbook. And the rest of the so-called candidates have done no better.

So perhaps someone needs to tell them that even this fouled-up campaign is not limited to a choice between opposing Trump and alienating his supporters on the one hand and totally sucking up to him on the other. After all you don’t necessarily have to criticize Trump (and therefore set off his base) to propose new ideas.

Or is it just that there are really no ideas these folks can come up with that make sense to the world – yet are not sure to anger Trump and his base? And why is that? Can they really be that incapable of thinking outside the tightly-confined box the Republicans have stuffed themselves into? Is it possible that out of the entire Republican Party there is not a single original idea which the American voting public could get behind that was not inspired by Trump?

After all (to state the obvious) Trump is not exactly a font of knowledge or creativity. How many ideas has even he come up with, which were not already entrenched aspects of the populist conservative milieu?

Sunshine and Clorox bleach are two that come to mind. But I digress.

I know politicians are not a particularly creative lot. That, in a way, is what makes them politicians. Their approach to creativity seems limited to sticking their finger in the wind – all in support of their primary skill – an ability to think, act and talk like everyone else. But at least they generally have a core set of values and approaches they can bring with them to the political table, along with some idea of what they’re trying to achieve.

Not this bunch. What is Vivek Ramaswamy trying to achieve, beyond being Trump’s right hand man? What about Ron DeSantis? What are any of them trying to achieve, besides getting elected? In fact that may be the reason for the problem. They’re all so focussed on avoiding Trump in order to get elected, that they can’t think beyond that singular aspect of the campaign.

And I know it isn’t a new thought – that politicians are more void than substance. But this seems to be a new low.

In fact, about the only idea coming out of this campaign that is not endorsed by Donald Trump, has come from folks like Chris Christie and Nikki Hailey. And it’s not all that original or creative.

It’s the idea of supporting Ukraine. But to me that is such a no-brainer, that it’s not even worthy of debate. I don’t want to get into it here, because that’s not what this blog is about. But I think it needs to be said, if only to help make a point.

How can we not be willing to spend money and ammunition to support and equip a country and an armed forces that is fighting our war for us? And how can anyone dispute the fact that it is our war, the entire democratic world’s war, and one that could shape and define our world for a generation or more? Yet not a single one of us has to go to the war zone to fight and risk death and debilitating injury. All we have to do is financially and otherwise support the people who are willing, if not eager, to do that fighting and dying for us. How can that not be a win-win for us in every possible way?

So if that’s the only “idea” this bunch of Republicans can bring to the table, what a pathetic lot they must be, and what a disaster this campaign is likely to be for the country, if not the entire world.

Sorry, I really didn’t want to end this (or any) blog on such a negative note. But if I’m being honest, I really don’t see any way around it here. The only other thing I can think to say, is that if you want to see what I think we should be looking for in a candidate, especially in this rather singular moment in our history, have a look at Charlie Wyatt, the main character in my book The Contrarian Candidate.

[And sorry again if this seems shameless, but I think it really does need to be said. So just have a look at the sample pages by clicking the link for the eBook version at Amazon].

Donald Trump is not the retiring kind. Sure, he’s hunkered down licking his wounds for now. But that won’t last long, and certainly not as long as an exhausted country is hoping. And when he comes out of his cave, he’s going to be hungry – for revenge, for validation, for the chance to prove the country wrong. Which means he’s going to be on the attack against anything and anyone he feels did him wrong – according to his troubling sense of right and wrong.

Which means he’s going to continue to discredit the electoral system, including the administrators and the courts – the Supreme Court included. He’s going to be attacking the Democrats and their voters, especially the kind that were dancing in the streets at his expense. He’ll be decrying Republicans for not providing enough support and fealty, despite their near total contrition to his will. He’ll be whining about the media, for reporting the truth about the election, and… well pretty much everything they’ve said about him over the past four years. And he’ll be denouncing the Federal Reserve and the entire scientific and medical community – for failing to save his presidency. 

In short, he’ll be out to get them all.

And if past is any kind of prologue, the media will be right there with him, covering it wall to wall, Tweet by Tweet, grievance by grievance. Which means they’ll be giving him all the attention he craves – and therefore all the power he needs to do whatever it is he wants to do.

Oh sure, ‘Sleepy Joe’ will manage to get his share of coverage, and it will be positive enough for the most part – certainly throughout the honeymoon period. But that won’t last forever. And when it ends, my guess is that things will take a marked turn – and not for the better. 

After all, Biden will be dealing with some pretty sticky issues, ones that are not easily resolved. And then there’s that one overarching issue that will likely prove all but impossible to resolve. And it’s an issue that, as near as I can tell, he has no idea how to deal with – that of healing the national divide. 

I really don’t see what he has planned for healing that divide – other than being a really nice guy and hoping everyone will suddenly see the world the way he does, and therefore finally join hands in a national and historic ‘kumbaya’ moment. Nor do I see what he could have planned.

Which means that insoluble problem is almost certain to become an immovable object in the middle of the road to resolving the most immediate and pressing of his concerns – that of ending the pandemic. 

Because that divide between Republicans and Democrats in their attitudes towards COVID prevention measures is only going to widen. Which means every measure we have for dealing with the pandemic is going to become an even more divisive hot button issue in the weeks and months to come.

And to make matters worse, Biden did everything he could throughout his campaign to make it seem as though he had a fantastic new way of dealing with the pandemic, and that with him at the helm, the COVID crisis would suddenly take a magical turn – like the one Trump has been dreaming out loud about for months now. 

But what is Biden really going to be able to do, that is so different from what the Trump administration has been doing?

Sure Trump messed up at the start of the pandemic, to say the least – and in a catastrophic way. But, as I argued in a previous blog on the subject, other than in his messaging, which admittedly isn’t nothing, what can Biden really do that is so different? 

And even as far as messaging goes, how much of an impact can he really have at this stage in the game? Because, as I say, it seems opinions are pretty much baked into the cake at this point, certainly as far as wearing face masks, practicing social distancing, and shutting down the economy – all of which seems to be the totality of the tools now in the tool box. So again, what can Joe Biden really do?

The one area that decidedly does have room for improvement, is testing. But even there, most experts seem to agree that improvements in testing at this late stage will not have nearly the impact many seem to be claiming, and certainly not what they’d have had at the beginning of the pandemic. 

Besides, does anyone really think Biden has some kind of magic bullet that will radically improve the testing regime in the country? If he does, why isn’t he sharing it with us? Why wait until he takes office to unveil such a magical plan? It makes no sense. Which tells me there is no plan, and that there really is very little he can do to markedly alter the course of the disease.

At some point, hopefully soon, a vaccine will become available in serious numbers. But how likely is it the vaccination process will go as smoothly as hoped? And what will be the reaction across the nation when things start to go wrong? 

Just imagine how the process is likely to play out, amid the kinds of soaring infection rates that are expected in the months to come. 

As we all know, the country is now experiencing new and alarming rates of infection, that are likely to accelerate over the winter months. So think of the scramble to distribute a vaccine in that climate. There will be 300,000,000 people waiting in line in the U.S., and billions more around the world. It’s going to feel like we’re all treading water in a shark infested lagoon, waiting for a boat to come and save us.

So how do you think people are going to react when they know there is an easy way for them to be safe, while at the same time getting their lives back in order – but they are each going to have to wait their turn?

The American public is not a patient lot at the best of times. And they are not going to be happy. 

Meanwhile, to the extent the media is able to take its collective eyes off Trump, they are going to be zeroing in on every little issue – every wrinkle in the plan, every delay, every setback, every new announcement and report – such as where the critical vials are headed, who is getting inoculated and why, and who is jumping the line. And then there will be questions about the actual effectiveness of the vaccine, and what the side effects might be.

Cue the anti-vaxxers. 

That will be Biden’s next big headache. A good percentage of the population, mainly Trump voters, are going to refuse to be vaccinated. Which means the whole inoculation regime is going to be much less effective, even for those who choose to go along, which will mainly be Biden voters. 

How will Biden manage to wrangle his way through that tangled mess? And how aggressive is he prepared to be? 

And all this will be playing out with Trump fully behind the vaccine deniers.

All of which means it is not going to be an easy time for the newly minted Biden administration – to say the least. In fact it’s going to be one big hot steaming mess. And Trump will be watching it all unfold on his favorite news network, buckets of fried chicken at the ready, hurling Tweets the size of bunker busters at the Biden world. 

And not only will that make Biden and his administration seem weak, it will make Trump seem all the stronger. After all, it’s easy to look smart in retrospect. And he’s become something of an expert at finding ways to do that. And now he’ll have all the time in the world to put that expertise to use, second guessing every false step Biden takes. 

And he’ll be doing that with tens of millions of followers hanging on his every word. And through it all, the entire media establishing will be hanging right there with them. Of that you can be sure.