Trump's Twitter Attacks Are Backfiring

[babylonsister]

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/07/trump-tweets-elijah-cummings-impeachment-democrats/594970/

Trump’s Twitter Attacks Are Backfiring
President Trump seems eager to divert attention from impeachment and investigations, but distractions work only if they distract.
11:39 AM ET
David A. Graham

snip//

There are several reasons to question the efficacy of Trump’s distraction here. The first is that it means that a piece of good news for the president Friday afternoon, a Supreme Court decision that allows the Trump administration to begin work on a wall on the southern border while litigation continues, has been largely overlooked.

A second is the same as the point that I and many others made after Trump’s attack on the squad: Exploiting racial tension has been a successful strategy for Trump and many other politicians, but open racism is, in addition to its moral repugnance, a risky electoral ploy.

Third, and perhaps most important, a distraction works only if it distracts. Trump has successfully turned the conversation to his tweets about Cummings, but he has not turned it away from impeachment. In fact, he’s deepened his problems: As of yesterday, 107 House Democrats back an impeachment inquiry, up from the mid-90s last week. That’s almost half the caucus. Non–House members, including Patty Murray, a top Senate Democrat, have also voiced support.

This is in part a testament to Cummings’s standing inside the caucus. There have been tensions between more establishment Democrats and the squad since the start of the Congress—notably between Pelosi and the foursome. When Trump attacked them, Democrats rallied against him, but they may have hesitated to line up too loudly behind the rabble-rousers. Cummings, however, is a 23-year House veteran, a committee chair, and former chair of the Congressional Black Caucus. As my colleague Peter Nicholas notes, he was also a Democrat who was willing to work with the White House, so Trump’s attack shows that he’s willing to go scorched-earth even on members who are far more restrained than Ilhan Omar. The president may have underestimated the extent to which Democrats would rally around Cummings.

The spark of Trump’s fury at Cummings matters too. Setting aside the bile about Baltimore, what Trump is angry about is the subpoenas. No president likes being subpoenaed, but they are a well-established tool of Congress. I wrote in May that the more Trump stonewalls congressional investigations, the more likely it is that Congress acts. Members of the House may flinch at hauling Trump up for impeachment on obstruction of justice related to the Mueller report or other causes, seeing political peril for themselves, but once Trump starts infringing on their prerogatives as a body, members start getting fired up.

When the president throws this kind of over-the-top tantrum about the Oversight Committee’s tactics, he’s falling into just this trap. His attack on Cummings is designed to change the focus, but he’s actually zooming it in.

[dalton99a]

1. Yep, he is worried about the subpoenas

[Marie Marie]

7. Especially any that would be for his beloved Ivanka.

[olegramps]

8. Is that the child that he seemed to lusts for? His wife sleeps in a seperate bed room.

[lagomorph777]

9. She's one of the children he lusts for.

[jayschool2013]

13. Maybe Malaria is still doing some escort work in her spare time. NT

[uponit7771]

15. +1

[Wellstone ruled]

2. Well stated.

And yes,those Subpoena's as well as the Contempt Citations issues to Barr and Ross are cutting the Racist President to the Quick.

Now that he has step over the Racist Propaganda line,things are going to get darn loud in the coming days.

[marble falls]

3. "Distractions only work if they distract", and when they don't, they draw attention.

[Gothmog]

4. Hopefully the country is not as racist as trump believes

[Bettie]

6. I suspect the little corner of it

inhabited by his base is more racist than he believes, but it is WAY smaller than he thinks it is.

[olegramps]

12. Just visit a few so-called working class guys' hangouts. Racism is alive and thriving.

Trump has made it respectful to spew outright racism publicly in certain venues. Don't bother telling me about the South. I have numerous family though out the deep South that were compelled to hide their racism publicly, but have found fertile ground to openly voice derogatory hatred with total abandon. Its new accepted political speech.

[NewJeffCT]

5. another reason for the attack

is that Cummings' committee sent subpoenas Jared and Ivanka over their personal communications

[Roy Rolling]

10. The act is stale

Trump is boring, and only interesting in the same way a car wreck on the side of the road is interesting.

He’s a spectacle, and that type of entertainment grows old because eventually people are tired of the scripted drama. And if Trump fu**s up and gets people killed, people will really be pissed at Trump’s malfeasance and bullshit attitude.

[onetexan]

11. "may have underestimated the extent to which Democrats would rally around Cummings" - are u freaking

kidding me??

The damn media treats this Idiot like he is a normal, sensible, measured, legit president. This guy is an ignorant, vindictive and dangerous buffoon with neither a modicum of self control nor the smarts to either plan or think through his attacks. He shoots from the hip every time. It's then up to his enablers to do damage control. Shameful and disgraceful that the entire GOP have let our Republic come to this.

The one little bit i will give credit to the statement above is that yes, Cummings is a revered and well-respected member of the Dem party, so attacking him in the most vile, racist way will have party compatriots come out swinging. If Republican Congressmen have any ounce of self-respect and duty to country they should come out defending Cummings as well. But of course we've not seen even 1 so far.

[TryLogic]

14. Trump has outed himself and his followers and enablers as vile rancid racists.