A Long One

Matt Taibbi at Rolling Stone:

Trump's shocking rise and spectacular fall have been a singular disaster for U.S. politics. Built up in the press as the American Hitler, he was unmasked in the end as a pathetic little prankster who ruined himself, his family and half of America's two-party political system for what was probably a half-assed ego trip all along, adventure tourism for the idiot rich.

That such a small man would have such an awesome impact on our nation's history is terrible, but it makes sense if you believe in the essential ridiculousness of the human experience. Trump picked exactly the wrong time to launch his mirror-gazing rampage to nowhere. He ran at a time when Americans on both sides of the aisle were experiencing a deep sense of betrayal by the political class, anger that was finally ready to express itself at the ballot box.

The only thing that could get in the way of real change – if not now, then surely very soon – was a rebellion so maladroit, ill-conceived and irresponsible that even the severest critics of the system would become zealots for the status quo.

As is usual for Taibbi, it's kind of long and navel-gaze-y and it's a bit emotionally nihilistic, but there's a truth to it that needs to be said, which is not just "Stoopid GOP - what the hell happened to you guys!?!"  

It is in fact partly that, but it's mostly: Hillary's not the horrible thing so many people are so eager to identify her as being, but she's also not the change agent so many of us think we need (at least she hasn't been for quite a while).

And for my own bad self, even though it's almost certain she'll win this thing, don't get happy. Don't start thinking we can hire her into the Oval Office and every shitty thing the GOP's been trying to pull will magically disappear.  The GOP will go on trying to pull shitty things, and a good politician like Hillary Clinton will go along with some of them in order to get a deal on some of things she wants to do.

Constant public pressure and the election of "left-leaning" congress critters will help Hillary stay with what we think we're electing her to do.