Maverick's World

Trump is insecure because he knows he didn't win the election. He knows what the RIS did or did not do in terms of anti-GOTV operations and the electoral tampering. He knows of the true extent of collaboration and he knows how illegal such a move is. He also knows that any election where such tactics are used is automatically null and the verdict void. That is why he is so supremely insecure about stupid things like crowd sizes at the inauguration. 

He knows his entire claim to the presidency is unlikely to stand up to any level of scrutiny. He also knows that his incompetence is so highly visible and that he will lose momentum as the major media decides to really put him to the question. So far he has gained from the adverse publicity and notoriety that main media houses got him, but that edge is wearing off. He is actually on the hook for delivering stuff he promised (which he has no intention of doing) and he knows when his followers figure out he isn't actually going to anything they will join in with the adverse narratives promoted by the media's critical review of his performance. 

We are seeing a similar situation on the TrumpCare front. The GOP and the Trump Admin are locked in a game of chicken. They want to see who backs down on the "Repeal and Replace" front and who takes credit for the "victory". The proposed TrumpCare replacement for Obamacare is just a tax cut for the super rich. Millions of Americans will die from the completely intentional consequences of cutting off healthcare. A sign of how bad this is that GOPers are refusing to adhere to their own publicly stated position of giving the public at least three days to review the bill before they vote on it. Today they will repeal Obamacare and replace it with TrumpCare without ever making the exact details of the bill public. It will be interesting to see how the GOPers spin this one as a "victory" and what the response of the 2nd Amendment types with pre-existing conditions to the GOPs actions will be. 

I don't really see this as anything more than a distraction. This is a fog created with the sole purpose of deflecting attention from the Trump Russia affair. 

The manner in which Trump stokes the troll army is more a reflection of his own awareness of the the increasingly unbridgeable gap between where he thinks he should be in public perception and where his own weird polling style is telling him where he is. He can't bear the lance to the ego that kind of knowledge brings with it. This by itself would have been bad for any president, but there is the added matter of an imminent criminal prosecution. 

Soon Sally Yates will testify before the HPSCI, even if Trump derails it another time with some tactical move, the day will come where everyone will hear that Trump was fully aware of Micheal Flynn's payments from Russia when he made him NSA. When that is entered into public record from a source with direct knowledge of the events, it will form the basis of a very solid line of inquiry about why Trump thought it was okay to disregard the advice of a senior law enforcement official about a foreign penetration at the top of the NSC. The questions that will follow from this will drag all the concerned parties including VP Pence into a black hole. While VP Pence might have a plan to push all the blame on Trump, there will be no out for Trump himself. The buck stops with him. 

One can reasonably expect some sort of interference in HPSCI functioning next week, but I don't think he or his Russian pals will attempt to harm Sally Yates. I suspect Sally has already entered her testimony into a sealed record that is cannot be erased. Furthermore if they move against Sally Yates physically, that will amount to a public admission of guilt and a direct implication in judicial intimidation of a witness. That is already a crime with significant penalties. 

He will do something as the bullshit machine is running out of material. Some version of negotiating with a gun to his own head. I am sure it will come up in the call with Pres. Putin today. A strategy will be worked out and ofcourse they will not release any records or read back of the call itself. 

A lot of faith in being put into the idea that it is possible to criminally prosecute Donald Trump at this time. It is plausible given the vast amount of evidence, but I think it is more likely that the evidence can be used to go after his children at a later time. He may escape criminal prosecution but his kids will not be quite that lucky. Sure these are rich people and they will fight it with highly paid lawyers and so on, but that works better in civil suits than it does on the national security side. When national security offenses are involved, your high price lawyer only delays the inevitable and milks you dry in the process.